News 25 November - 2 December 2021

And so to December, here’s some great news from the last week.

Hello once more and welcome back to the savage world of employment. We start this week with an article alleging that work is becoming more secure.(1) Although the same people report that 6 in 10 workers would change jobs for better parental leave.(2) So people are more secure but would change job at the drop of a hat. Sticking with the theme of the current landscape we have an article which questions the genuine flexibility of hybrid working.(3)

Next we seamlessly segway into this weeks more prominent caselaw. The first involves hybrid working and discrimination by association.(4) Next we have the case of a postman who was sacked after he left parcels in a customers bin, and they were disposed of.(5)

We have an article which looks at the need for government to legislate on home working.(6)  Never one to move too quickly, the government has made consultation overtures in this direction. We have two article worth reading this week from The Lawyer, the first looks at the impact of changing social values on the workplace.(7) The second looks at post Brexit frontier workers and international agreements.(8)  We have an article on annual leave and holiday pay for temporary workers(9) and we also have a ‘Tom’s Guide’ to navigating 8 employment issues.(10)  

Now we move on to Act four which as usual, covers all the other issues. We start with the release of new statutory pay rates.(11) CAP has published its guidance on depicting mental health conditions.(12)  Not long after Jeff Bezos thanked all of his workers for their contribution to his space games, amazon workers globally are complaining about pay & conditions.(13)  We have a great article which outlines which countries have the largest numbers of employed women.(14)  We also look at the BMA decision to consider industrial action if GP’s are forced to begin large scale face-to-face consultations again.(15)  

As usual, we end with the TUC. We have two articles this week. The first is a call for government to implement ‘systemic change’ to end violence against girls and women.(16) The second is a call to increase sick pay rates to prevent financial hardship over Christmas.(17)