Cornwall County Council v Prater: EAT 8 Jun 2005

EAT Contract of Employment – In this case we have held that where a Claimant teacher has accepted a succession of short term special teaching assignments, in circumstances where the Respondent employer was not obliged to offer further assignments and the teacher was not obliged to accept them, she was to be regarded nevertheless as having been continuously employed by the Respondent by virtue of S.212 of the Employment Rights Act 1996. On the particular facts of the case any gaps between the assignments were to be disregarded because the Claimant was only absent on account of a temporary cessation of work. The lack of mutuality of obligation before and after the completion of assignments did not of itself prevent the assignments from constituting contracts of employment.

Judges:

HHJ Serota QC

Citations:

[2005] UKEAT 0055 – 05 – 0806

Links:

Bailii

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Cited by:

Appeal fromCornwall County Council v Prater CA 24-Feb-2006
The claimant worked for the local authority under a series of contracts. The employer denied that she had been continuously employed and there was no ‘irreducible minimum mutual obligation necessary to create a contract of service’. There were times . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Employment

Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227031