Sam Burnett considers the territorial reach of UK dismissal & discrimination protection
Two wives of servicemen, who were employed by the MOD at international schools situated in NATO headquarters in the Netherlands and Belgium, were dismissed when their husbands left the armed forces to become civilian employees of NATO. They brought claims of unfair dismissal and sex discrimination in the Watford employment tribunal. Did the tribunal have jurisdiction to hear their claims? The tribunal decided it did, and the EAT (see MOD v Wallis and Grocott (UKEAT/0546/08/ZT)) agreed.
Unfair dismissal
The right not to be unfairly dismissed generally applies to employees who are working in Great Britain at the time of their dismissal. However, some employees working abroad will have an employment relationship the characteristics of which are sufficiently exceptional that the right will also apply to them. Applying the principles laid down by the House of Lords by Lord Hoffmann in Lawson v Serco [2006] IRLR 289, the EAT in Wallis decided that there was a sufficiently special link between the wives’ employment
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