Settlement agreements/Protected conversations is this tinkering around the edges?

The Government is trying to make it easier for small employers, particularly, to have flexiblity in their workforce arrangements and not be burdened by costly legal bills.

However, at this stage there is a lot of consultation going on about how best that might be achieved without removing too many rights for employees.

We have already seen the change to unfair dismissal rights extended from one ot two years to allow employers more time to deal with employee issues.

Vince Cable says "Settlement agreements are smart, fair and pro-business reforms which deliver results for employees and employers. It empowers employers by enabling them to keep their workforce flexible and encouraging alternative ways of solving workplace problems rather than resorting to a tribunal.

Often small employers are not confident in dealing with difficult employee issues and these suggestions are aimed at making it easier for them not to fall fowl of the law.

Settlement agreements are meant to be a simplification of compromise agreements, with the Government possibly preparing a template of the agreements in the form of a letter that can be sent to employees. Allowing the conversations that take place around settlement agreements to be protected from disclosure if a case is taken to a tribunal by an employee.

There are still many unanswered questions which the consultation period may hopefully address.  At present compromise agreements require independent legal advise to be obtained before signing, is that going to change?

Even though employees can reject the agreements, will there be more pressure to sign under this new system?

We will have to wait until the results of the consultation in the summer for some of the answers to be provided.

Unfair dismissal timescales change 6th April 2012

Employees must have been with their employer for 1 year before they can claim unfair dismissal.  However, from 6th April 2012 it is to be raised to two years.  For those of us old enough to remember it used to be 2 years.

The new rules apply to those employees employed from the 6th April 2012 onwards and is not backdated for existing staff. 

These timescales do not apply to discrimination claims, so it will be interesting to see if more employees look for a discrimination angle.  If that is the case make sure you have kept good records of the reasons why performance was poor, the opportunities you gave the employee to improve and the consequences where clear if they did not meet the grade.  That way employees are clear about why they were dismissed and less likely to make up their own reasons for the dismissal.

Contractual arrangements and policies and procedures may refer to disapplying full disciplinary procedures for 1 year.  It will be interesting to see how this changes things going forward and whether employers revert to using the 2 year period.