Employment law advice

All employers must follow current employment law in the way they recruit, contract with and treat their staff. It can be difficult to know all the details but getting it wrong can land you in trouble.

The most common difficulties employers find themselves facing are:

Discrimination claims, especially age discrimination
Unfair dismissal claims
Redundancy disputes
Wrongful dismissal
Equal pay disputes
TUPE problems,
Team moves,
Removal of confidential business information,

Human Law Mediation offers advice and support for employers at three levels:

Legal representation – with extensive employment law experience Human Law Mediation can advise and represent your business in any employment related dispute. This includes handling case that go to Employment Tribunal, including advising on strategy, research and preparing the case, negotiating and providing advice on when to settle.

Solicitor, Justin Patten, has represented all manner of organisations over the years and is particularly experienced in working with the Charity and voluntary sectors.

Mediation – many employment disputes can be resolved out of Court. Mediation is a great way to get the parties together and come to an agreement. Human Law Mediation offer fixed fee mediation services with a fully qualified mediator accredited by the Academy of Experts.

As well as providing full mediation services Human Law Mediation also offer bespoke mediation training for organisations that want to introduce mediation skills to their managers and supervisors.

Consultancy – by taking a proactive approach to your employment policies and practices you can avoid employment disputes and protect your business from legal claims.

Human Law Mediation work with organisations to develop their employment policies and practices, providing practical legal advice on how to stay compliant whilst running a successful business or organisation.

For many clients we advise strategically on their employment policies and procedures, including:

Preparing disciplinary and grievance procedures
Advice on the conduct of disciplinary meetings
Performance management difficulties
Complying with Health and Safety legislation
Complying with discrimination and harassment laws
Maternity and paternity rights
Holidays and statutory leave
Sexual orientation management
Managing age discrimination
TUPE
Avoiding employment tribunals

Preventing employment law problems

Prevention is always better than cure, so being aware of your responsibilities will help. If you are an employee you must:

take recruitment decisions in a fair and non-discriminatory way.
check the eligibility of new staff to live and work in the UK.
provide employees with a written statement of employment particulars within two months of their starting work.
comply with the National Minimum Wage regulations. give workers paid annual leave a year based on set minimums
not ask workers to work an average of more than 48 hours a week unless they have given their voluntary consent in writing.
give employees time off work in specified circumstances other than annual leave (eg to deal with an emergency involving a dependant, or for antenatal appointments).
give serious consideration to requests to work flexibly from employees with parental responsibility of children aged 16 and under, and disabled children under 18 as well as carers of certain adults.
ensure that changes to employment contracts are discussed and agreed with employees or, where there is a collective agreement, with their representatives.
register with the Information Commissioner and comply with the Data Protection principles
provide access to a stakeholder pension
provide a safe working environment, comply with current health and safety legislation and ensure your staff do so too
not bully or discriminate against any of your workers on the basis of age, sex, sexual orientation, race, religion or disability and ensure your staff are not bullied or discriminated against by other members of staff