EAT Redundancy : Collective Consultation and Information – Judge held that when the bulk of a workforce, all or most of whom were employed under fixed term contracts, did not have those contracts renewed, their impending dismissals on expiry of the fixed terms were for a reason not related to the individuals: it was the withdrawal of Government funding for the work.
Since her decision, the Inner House of the Court of Session had decided University of Stirling v University College Union. That emphasised the importance of establishing the reason for dismissal, and that if there was more than one reason, all had to be unrelated to the individual if the dismissal was to be for redundancy for the purposes of s.188 TULR(C)A 1992. It indicated that agreeing and entering into a fixed-term contract was a matter individual to the employee, such that dismissal by reason of its termination could (and perhaps usually would) be such a reason. The judge here did not clearly identify that she had considered the reasons for dismissal of the employees said to number more than the necessary 20 to trigger consultation, and more particularly whether there was more than one reason for their dismissals all on the dates when their fixed terms expired. Accordingly, although it was open for a judge to find that the dismissals here were not for reasons related to the individuals, she had not clearly considered whether there might be other reasons which were so related: if she had done so, and found that a reason was the expiry of a pre-agreed fixed term, she might well have concluded that the consultation duty was not triggered.
Langstaff P J
[2014] UKEAT 0138 – 14 – 0807
Bailii
England and Wales
Employment
Updated: 21 December 2021; Ref: scu.536682