Manitoba – Collective agreements have a function and value of their own which exists wholly independently of any individual contract of employment. Lord Russell referred to a ‘Wage Agreement’ entered into between the appellant’s trade union and the Canadian Railway War Board, and said: ‘it does not appear to their Lordships to be a document adapted for conversion into or incorporation with a service agreement, so as to entitle master and servant to enforce inter se the terms of thereof . It consists of some 188 ‘rules’, which the railway companies contract with Division No. 4 to observe. It appears to their Lordships to be intended merely to operate as an agreement between a body of employers and a labour organisation by which the employers undertake that as regards their workmen, certain rules beneficial to the workmen shall be observed. By itself it constitutes no contract between any individual employee and the company which employs him. If an employer refused to observe the rules, the effective sequel would be, not an action by any employee, not even an action by Division no.4 against the employer for specific performance or damages, but the calling of a strike until the grievance was remedied.’
Lord Russell
[1931] AC 83, [1930] UKPC 94
Bailii
Commonwealth
Cited by:
Cited – The Highland Council v TGWU and Unison EAT 3-Jun-2008
EAT EQUAL PAY ACT: Equal value
Equal Pay claims. Whether letters sent to local authority employers by unions prior to coming into force of the statutory grievance procedures met the requirements of regulation . .
Cited – Alexander v Standard Telephones and Cables Ltd (No. 2) 1991
alexander_standard1991
The court considered under what circumstances a collective agreement between an employer and trades unions would be incorporated into an individual employee’s contract: ‘The so-called ‘normative effect’ by which it can be inferred that provisions of . .
Cited – George v The Ministry of Justice CA 17-Apr-2013
The claimant appealed against rejection of his claim that the respondent had broken his contract of employment as a prison officer by changing the collective agreement for prisons officers. The judge had found that the respective terms were not . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Employment
Leading Case
Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.276940