This article outlines an employer’s obligations under current employment protection legislation. Under this legislation, employees who meet various qualifying conditions have the right not to be unfairly dismissed. Employees who have been unfairly dismissed are able to seek a remedy by complaining to an employment tribunal.
Net Lawman provides a number of other information articles on dismissal. We recommend you read them first and then read this article on dismissal for pregnancy or maternity if it applies to you. The primary articles can be accessed here.
The general position
It is unfair dismissal to dismiss an employee (or select them for redundancy when others in similar circumstances are not selected) because they have sought to assert one of their statutory employment protection rights either by bringing proceedings against the employer to enforce the right or by suggesting in some other way that the employer has infringed the right.
Employees do not have to have specified the right they sought to assert, so long as they made it reasonably clear to the employer what that right was.
Provided that they have acted in good faith, employees are protected regardless of whether or not they did in fact qualify for the right they sought to assert and regardless of whether or not that right had in fact been infringed.
So if you dismiss an employee for asserting one of the following rights, it is unfair dismissal.
The right to receive
A written statement of employment particulars;
An itemised pay statement;
Guaranteed pay;
Remuneration during suspension on medical grounds;
Time off for public duties;
Time off to look for work or make arrangements for training prior to redundancy;
Time off for antenatal care;
Protection against unlawful deductions from pay;
Protection against unlawful receipt of payments by employer;
Protection against detriment in health and safety cases;
Minimum period of notice;
Deduction of unauthorised or excessive union subscriptions;
Protection against detriment in cases relating to Sunday shop or betting work;
Time off for employee pension scheme trustee duties or training;
Time off for employee representative duties or candidacy;
Working time, rest periods, breaks and annual leave;
Time off for study or training;
Parental leave;
Time off for dependants;
Time off for trade union duties and activities or training.
Or from:
Requiring the employer to stop payment of a contribution to a union's political fund;
Receiving detrimental treatment by any act, or any failure to act, on trade union grounds;
Making a public interest disclosure.
Qualifying period of service and age limits
There is no qualifying period of service or age limit for employees who wish to complain that they have been dismissed for one of the reasons described here.
If by chance you find some error of law or fact in any Net Lawman information page, do please tell us. We should also welcome your suggestions for new subjects for information pages. These notes:
Do not provide a complete or authoritative statement of the law;
Do not constitute legal advice by Net Lawman;
Do not create a contractual relationship;
Do not form part of any other advice, whether paid or free.
