A question arose as to the position of an employee wrongfully dismissed just before the end of his first 104 weeks of service where he would have qualified to have a right not to be unfairly dismissed if he had been given proper notice.
Held: The dismissal took place when the contract was terminated, and that the termination took place when the notice expired or was due to expire. ‘I would add at this point that I do not think the Act can be got round by wrongfully dismissing a person summarily or by giving him a notice that is too short. No person should be able to take advantage of his own wrong in that way. If an employer should try to escape the Act by giving no notice at all or a notice that was too short, I should have thought that the tribunal, by means of a claim for wrongful dismissal (see s 113 of the Act), or by some such way, would see that the employee would get the same compensation as he would have done if he had been given notice of a proper length.’
Judges:
Lord Denning MR, Megaw LJ
Citations:
[1972] IRLR 125
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Sally Harper v Virgin Net Limited CA 10-Mar-2004
The employee had been dismissed. Her contractual notice period was longer than the statutory period.
Held: The statutory notice period prevailed in calculating the date of dismissal. The contractual period could not be used to extend the total . .
Cited – Stapp v The Shaftesbury Society CA 1982
The employer had told the claimant: ‘I must ask you to relinquish your duties with effect from today 7 February 1981’ and thereby summarily dismissed him.
Held: The employer was clearly summarily dismissing with immediate effect in a wholly . .
Cited – Raspin v United Shops Ltd EAT 24-Mar-1999
A breach of contract by an employer failing to follow disciplinary procedure which leaves an employee unable to pursue claim for unfair dismissal, was remediable as a breach of contract by wrongful dismissal and damages accordingly. What must be . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Employment
Updated: 13 May 2022; Ref: scu.194623
