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Working matters

14 April 2011 / Ian Smith
Issue: 7461 + 7462 / Categories: Features , Tribunals , Employment
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Ian Smith reports on fixed-term employees legislation & an EAT decision on dismissal justification

On the legislative front the month up to the beginning of April was a busy one. In an exercise in business-friendly retrenchment, the government provided that flexible working rights are now not to be extended to all parents of children under 18, that the right to time off for study or training is not to be extended to those employed by employers of less than 250 employees and that the “two-tier workforce” code of practice applying to local authorities is now revoked.

On a more positive note, the equality duties in the Equality Act 2010 come into force (albeit that the underpinning regulations are subject to further consultation with a view to a July start, in shorter form), the new employment-related codes (on employment issues generally and specifically on equal pay) come into force on 6 April (which also sees the repeal of the old ones under the specific legislation on sex, race, etc) and the annual social security

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

FOIL—Bridget Tatham

FOIL—Bridget Tatham

Forum of Insurance Lawyers elects president for 2026

Gibson Dunn—Robbie Sinclair

Gibson Dunn—Robbie Sinclair

Partner joinslabour and employment practice in London

Muckle LLP—Ella Johnson

Muckle LLP—Ella Johnson

Real estate dispute resolution team welcomes newly qualified solicitor

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
Paper cyber-incident plans are useless once ransomware strikes, argues Jack Morris of Epiq in NLJ this week
In this week's NLJ, Robert Hargreaves and Lily Johnston of York St John University examine the Employment Rights Bill 2024–25, which abolishes the two-year qualifying period for unfair-dismissal claims
Writing in NLJ this week, Manvir Kaur Grewal of Corker Binning analyses the collapse of R v Óg Ó hAnnaidh, where a terrorism charge failed because prosecutors lacked statutory consent. The case, she argues, highlights how procedural safeguards—time limits, consent requirements and institutional checks—define lawful state power
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