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NLJ this week: Restraint of trade, fear of Covid & meaning of ‘employee’

24 June 2022
Issue: 7984 / Categories: Legal News , Employment , Covid-19
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In this week’s NLJ, employment barrister Ian Smith investigates a trio of unusual cases, including on the issue of when a court can directly enforce a valid restraint of trade clause against an ex-employee, (and what about their need to earn a living?)

Smith also covers the difference between an ‘employee’ in tax and an ‘employee’ in employment law, and whether an employee dismissed for their fear of coronavirus is protected under health and safety dismissal laws.

This third case is the first reported appellate decision on the issue. Smith writes: ‘There has been much speculation whether an employee dismissed for leaving work or, more particularly, refusing to come back to work, because of fears of contracting coronavirus could claim automatically unfair dismissal under the health and safety provisions of s 100(1)(d)–(e) of the Employment Rights Act 1996.’

Issue: 7984 / Categories: Legal News , Employment , Covid-19
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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Muckle LLP—Ella Johnson

Muckle LLP—Ella Johnson

Real estate dispute resolution team welcomes newly qualified solicitor

Morr & Co—Dennis Phillips

Morr & Co—Dennis Phillips

International private client team appoints expert in Spanish law

NLJ Career Profile: Stefan Borson, McCarthy Denning

NLJ Career Profile: Stefan Borson, McCarthy Denning

Stefan Borson, football finance expert head of sport at McCarthy Denning, discusses returning to the law digging into the stories behind the scenes

NEWS
Cryptocurrency is reshaping financial remedy cases, warns Robert Webster of Maguire Family Law in NLJ this week. Digital assets—concealable, volatile and hard to trace—are fuelling suspicions of hidden wealth, yet Form E still lacks a section for crypto-disclosure
NLJ columnist Stephen Gold surveys a flurry of procedural reforms in his latest 'Civil way' column
Michael Zander KC, emeritus professor at LSE, revisits his long-forgotten Crown Court Study (1993), which surveyed 22,000 participants across 3,000 cases, in the first of a two-part series for NLJ
Getty Images v Stability AI Ltd [2025] EWHC 2863 (Ch) was a landmark test of how UK law applies to AI training—but does it leave key questions unanswered, asks Emma Kennaugh-Gallagher of Mewburn Ellis in NLJ this week
Paper cyber-incident plans are useless once ransomware strikes, argues Jack Morris of Epiq in NLJ this week
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