As part of candidate Emmanuel Macron’s program during the Presidential elections campaign, a substantial reform of the French employment Code was promised. After his election as President, French commentators anticipated new changes would be implemented quickly, given Emmanuel Macron’s indications that he wished to go ahead as soon as possible, without too much debate before
When an organisation is considering making redundancies, it is important to consider whether employees who are pregnant or on parental leave are afforded any special protections under Australian law.
Both the Fair Work Act 2009 and anti-discrimination legislation include provisions particularly relating to pregnancy and parental leave, including the right to return to the same or a similar position. The fact that declaring a position redundant may result in the termination of an individual’s employment means consideration must be had to whether the termination employee’s employment is in fact lawful, even if there are genuine grounds for making a position redundant. This takes into account whether the termination violates any of the protections afforded to pregnant and parental leave employees. In addition, the fact that the Fair Work Act 2009 provides a reverse onus of proof for adverse action matters means that there is an even higher obligation on employers to ensure that the redundancy was lawful in all of the circumstances.
The position in Australia can be contrasted against the position in France, for example, where employers are not allowed to dismiss an employee from the moment she is medically certified as being pregnant and must reinstate an employee who was terminated when pregnant when informed of her pregnancy. The position in France is discussed in an earlier post which can be assessed at the following link.
This post was also contributed by Tony Rau, Trainee, Norton Rose Fulbright LLP (Munich).
German law provides for extensive protection of pregnant employees and employees on leave in connection with pregnancy. Regarding the latter, German law distinguishes between maternity leave (i.e. 6 weeks before until 8 weeks after childbirth – or 6 weeks before until
As is the case in many other countries (particularly countries in the European Union, which are covered by EU Directive 92/85/CEE dated 19 October 1992), France has implemented a full set of rules with the goal of protecting pregnant employees or employees on maternity leave against illegitimate termination of their employment contract. These protections also
It is not unlawful in itself to make an employee redundant who is pregnant or on maternity leave. This means that, subject to the special protection enjoyed in respect of alternative employment referred to below, the fairness and lawfulness of the redundancy dismissal will be determined in the same way as other redundancy dismissals. So,
Dismissing an employee due to economic difficulties is extremely delicate in France. A law dated 8th August 2016 has specified the definition of the economic grounds for dismissals, providing that economic difficulties are, in particular, characterized by a significant evolution of an indicator such as a significant drop of turnover, a significant drop in purchase
This post was contributed by Jahan Meeran, Trainee Solicitor, Norton Rose Fulbright LLP, London
A recent decision of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) illustrates the pitfalls of not adopting a sensitive consultation process in the event of redundancy..
In the case, the claimant had been employed by the property management division of his employer for
In the recent case of Skinner et al v Asciano Services Pty Ltd T/A Pacific National Bulk [2017] FWCFB 574 the Full Bench found that an employer breached its obligation to explore redeployment options under s.389(2) of the Fair Work Act 2009 after making 7 of its employees redundant without properly considering job swaps and voluntary redundancies with other employees. These 7 employees who had previously had their unfair dismissal applications dismissed, consequently had their applications remitted for re-hearing.
In a decision dated December 7, 2016, Italy’s Supreme Court – the Corte di Cassazione – confirmed that the dismissal of an individual employee for redundancy can be legally grounded solely on business-related reasons, such as improving the company’s competitiveness, reducing costs, or increasing profits. The decision was based on the constitutional principle of “freedom of private enterprise.”
If an employee is entitled to redundancy pay on termination, but their employer has obtained other acceptable employment for them, the employer can apply to the Fair Work Commission (FWC) for an order under the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) (FW Act) to reduce (including to nil) the amount of redundancy pay that is due to the employee.
The employer is required to demonstrate that:
In the recent decision of Sodexo Australia Pty Ltd T/A Sodexo [2016] FWC 4012, Deputy President Sams of the FWC considered the second test of whether the alternative employment was “acceptable”.