Notice is normally needed in order to lawfully end an employment contract. A failure to give notice – by either party – will usually be a breach of contract. Many employers include PILON – payment in lieu of notice – clauses in employment contracts to enable them to end employment early provided they pay the correct notice pay. If an employee resigns, there will be no dismissal. However, s95 Employment Rights Act 1996 says that an employee is dismissed if the employment contract is terminated by the employer, with or without notice. The EAT has looked at a case where the employee resigned but the employer ended the contract before the notice period had ended by making a payment in lieu of notice. The employee said he had been dismissed and was therefore entitled to bring an unfair dismissal claim.
The government has confirmed that it has accepted the views of the Low Pay Commission and apply the following increases in the National Living Wage and National Minimum Wage from 01 April 2022:
Even for seasoned employment law practitioners, the decision of P&O to sack its entire workforce with no notice and by pre-recorded video came as a shock. No warnings, no consultation, no in-person discussions. Such was the shock and speed of the dismissals that some employees were unable to gather all their belongings in time. P&O’s plan is to reduce costs by replacing the entire 800-strong workforce with much cheaper agency workers to whom they believe the UK’s national minimum wage rules will not apply.
Nathan Hughes joined Bermans in February 2022 and is Solicitor in our Corporate team based in Manchester.
He works with SME’s and owner managed businesses and is experienced in corporate law, merges and acquisitions, corporate finance and investments, company law and business advice.
Nathan studied Law with Philosophy at The University of Liverpool and qualified as a solicitor in 2021.
Outside of work, he has an interest in castles and has visited many in Wales and England, with his personal recommendation being Harlech Castle in North Wales. He also enjoys playing guitar and science fiction.
Nikhil joined Bermans in October 2022 and qualified as a Solicitor in September 2025, he is currently working in our ABL Team.
His areas of expertise includes assisting a broad array of lenders with their invoice finance, asset-based lending and general corporate finance deals and providing commercial and practical advice to supplement this.
Nikhil graduated from Manchester Metropolitan University with a law degree in 2019 as well as a Distinction in the Legal Practice Course in 2021.
Outside of work, Nikhil enjoys playing a variety of sports such as football and padel, whilst also being a passionate Manchester United supporter. He is also a keen traveller having explored a variety of countries such as Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore.
As we are moving towards the second anniversary of the pandemic it is worth pausing to reflect that, after some initial reluctance, technology has been quite successfully embraced both by lawyers and also by the courts to keep the system running.
Obviously meetings between lawyers and clients have largely been replaced by virtual contact through Microsoft Teams and Zoom, but virtual contact has now taken a firm foothold in relation to the litigation process.
Readers may recall our lengthy article on the somewhat contentious schools leasing issue in a recent Briefing following the High Court judgment in the Schools Facilities Management case which can be found here.
In our last Briefing we reported on the Court of Appeal decision on broker commissions in Wood v Commercial First Business Ltd and the rather surprising decision of the NACFB in recommending that “both regulated and unregulated firms, working in all sectors, should be transparent about their commissions and fully disclose the amount of commission received”.
With the industry still reeling from revelations emerging from the demise of a certain Lessee, and taking into account the sensitivities of referring to any of the specific current or forthcoming matters in which we are instructed, we thought it might be worthwhile making some general remarks on steps which Funders may wish to consider to prevent being the victims of serious fraud going forward.
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