Redundancy - General Questions

lbr0wn

I'm about to go through my first redundancy process at work with the company having recently announced plans for a large reduction to it's workforce. I'm quite fortunate in that I have strong academics, good experience and am generally quite confident of being able to find something else within a relatively short space of time - I suspect this is a far better situation than some of colleagues would be in having worked there for numerous years and not had to look for a job in quite some time. It those guys that I feel for.

Partly due to this reason, partly because I don't think the company is in a position to further my career and partly because I have genuine concerns about the working environment after the redundancies I have applied for VR. I understand this is not a right and that the company is under no obligation to accept my request. However, due to some failed promises on their side regarding promotions - I hope they will allow me to move on. Accordingly I would like to understand what leverage I might be able to have with them if indeed i have any at all:-

1) The company are making posts redundant but the overall volume of work will remain unchanged. In effect they will be expecting people to do more work after the exercise.

- Is this permissible or does the employer have a responsibility to reorganise and keep workloads manageable?

2) It is likely that my duties would be expanded to include management responsibilities for an area that is not strictly related to mine. For example, Purchasing and Training something as disparate as that. (not actually the two by the way)

- If it was as random as this, could I refuse the new role and if so would I still get redundancy pay? Further, could I refer back to my application for VR and get those terms?

3) I accepted the role on the basis of the work/life balance, the fact that I had a professional qualification in my current area and that this role would help me to progress me career.
My role was diluted into another area that was not directly related to my qualification shortly after I joined and this was a fait au complet. I actually have an email from my line manager saying she and another person agreed the additional duties sat better with me!

Other elements of my role were then taken off me that do relate to my professional qualification without consultation on my revised job scope and the person now doing them is a grade higher than me. I was given the opportunity to apply for the role but at that point it was advertised at lower grade and was therefore not as interesting to me.

I was also told that a job would be created for me and told that this would be imminent by a senior person within the company. Following this I got an email the other day and it had been given to someone else, again, completely out of the blue with no discussion first.

Fast forward to now and following the redundancies, I don't want my further diluted into different areas as it starts to affect my future career opportunities.

Therefore can I reject a revised role based on further dilution and although I don't want to become difficult, if the company then says I've resigned, does this start to sound like constructive dismissal?

As I say hopefully it will be fine but I like to know what my options are!

Thank you in advance