Article Category: Education – Insight & Opinion

10th October 2019 marked World Mental Health Day, an annual campaign designed to raise awareness of mental health illness. According to the most recent statistics provided by Mental Health First Aid England, there were 526,000 cases of work-related stress, depression or anxiety in Great Britain which accounts for approximately 72 million working days lost, costing… Read more »

The government’s proposals to take forward recommendations from the Taylor Review have been published in the Good Work Plan and is dubbed as the biggest package of workplace reforms for over 20 years. Effectively, these changes are intended to significantly change the landscape and provide workers with more employment law rights. Below is a summary… Read more »

Since October 2011, under the Agency Workers Regulations (AWR), temporary agency workers — such as supply teachers from agencies — are entitled to the same basic working and employment conditions after working for a period of 12 weeks as if they have been employed directly by the hirer. This includes remuneration, paid holiday, working hours… Read more »

In 2015, the Government decided to enforce public sector pension changes due to the overbearing costs and change to average lifetime earnings. By moving away from final salary pension schemes, a ‘transitional protection’ scheme was introduced instead. This new scheme kept public sector workers closer to retirement age on a more generous pension. It also… Read more »

Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) changes implemented on 1st August 2019 saw the introduction of a withdrawals policy. This policy means that DBS will no longer amend enhanced DBS check applications — made after 1st August 2019 — where missing or incorrect information has been identified in particular fields (detailed below). The applications in question… Read more »

Schools will be familiar with the DfE’s ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ and ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ documents. A recent update which will be published on 2nd September 2019 has further strengthened the requirements for schools and academies, and will bring about a new Keeping Children Safe in Education 2019 document. The document is… Read more »

The Court of Appeal has confirmed that term time workers’ holiday pay should not be on a pro-rata basis, but should instead be calculated using their average earnings over the preceding 12-week period. Lord Justice Nicholas Underhill stated that the working time regulations did not require leave for workers to be reduced to a pro-rata… Read more »

It has been well publicised of late how important it is for employers to undertake a fair, reasonable and impartial investigation process. The recent case of the Governing Body of Tywyn Primary School v Aplin emphasises this, bringing to light constructive dismissal and possible discrimination during their disciplinary investigation process. What happened? An openly-gay headteacher,… Read more »

Mr Lone was dismissed for gross misconduct from his position following a complaint made by a female colleague. The colleague complained of unwanted messages and emails sent by the Claimant. Following the dismissal, a professional conduct panel for the Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) recommended to the Secretary of State that a prohibition order be put… Read more »

Disciplinary investigations are the foundation of any disciplinary proceedings. The investigation needs to be both fair and reasonable, impartial and the accused must have the opportunity to comment on relevant documents and evidence. The recent case of Mr M Whittaker v Governing Body of Sutton Oak Church of England Primary emphasised the importance of these,… Read more »