Legal Aspects of Business: Employment Law and Discrimination

This report, addressing the legal aspects of business, examines UK employment law, particularly concerning the relationship between employers and employees. It delves into key legislation such as the Equity Act 2010, focusing on employee rights, including protection against unfair dismissal and discrimination. The report analyzes the concept of misconduct and the 'Burchell test' for fair dismissal, providing a detailed case study involving a cafeteria owner and a pregnant employee suspected of theft. It emphasizes the importance of proper workplace investigations, referencing ACAS guidelines and highlighting considerations like the right to be accompanied and confidentiality. The report also addresses the complexities of gross misconduct and maternity, offering practical advice on conducting investigations fairly and avoiding discrimination claims. The report provides a letter of legal advice in the annexure to the client.

Running Head: Legal Aspects of Business 0
Legal aspects of Business
Student’s Name
12/13/2018

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Contents
Letter of Legal Advice.....................................................................................................................2
Annexure A......................................................................................................................................3
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
The scope of employment laws in the UK.......................................................................................3
Equity Act 2010...............................................................................................................................4
Rights of Employees........................................................................................................................6
Dismissal based on Conduct............................................................................................................6
Workplace Investigation: ACAS Guidelines...................................................................................8
Gross Misconduct and Maternity.....................................................................................................9
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................10
References......................................................................................................................................11

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Letter of Legal Advice
To,
Mr. Adam,
Sub: Letter of Advice
Ref.- Case of missing money from the cafeteria
Respected Sir,
This is a response to the request of letter of advised asked by you in the matter related to missing
money in your cafeteria. The subjective letter of advice is attached herewith as Annexure A for
your perusal. You are requested to review the same. We hope that the same will fulfill your
expectations. You are requested to consider advice provided under this report while dealing with
your employee Jane in the matter of missing money.
Have a Nice day!
Your Sincerely

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Annexure A
Introduction
The relationship of an employer and employee is a trustworthy and they both are required to
consider the interest of each other. In every nation, certain employment laws are there that
manage and regulate the stated relationship. In the UK, employment law consists of more than
one legislation. These legislations provide many aspects related to employment such as
recruitment, discrimination, dismissal, health, and safety in the workplace and so on
(Employmentlaws.co.uk, 2018). Both the employers and employees are required to consider the
provisions of these laws while performing their roles. The same is required for the reason that
courts also consider these laws while granting the decision in the cases of disputes related to the
employment relationship. In the given case, Mr. Adam (hereinafter referred as a client) is facing
an issue related to the application of these laws. He is the owner of a cafeteria and some money
has been missed form his cafeteria as there is a difference between the total amount of bills and
total money received. The suspect of this incident is a pregnant employee and therefore the
investigation with her is a matter of concern. In the given report, the focus will be made on the
provisions of employment law related to discrimination and dismissal. Further, by providing an
idol manner of investigation, advice will be provided to the client.
The scope of employment laws in the UK
In order to discuss the aspects of these laws, first, this is required to discuss that what theses
legislations covers. This is to state that employment law of the nation covers almost every aspect

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and causes of possible dispute. The purpose of the development of employment law is to secure
the rights and interest of the employer as well as employees of different organizations. In
addition to this, these laws provide guidelines for running a business organization. In order to
protect the fundamental rights of the employees, these laws consist the provisions related to
remuneration, leaves, working environment, working hours of employees and many others. The
employment law is considered as one of the oldest laws in the UK. Moving the focus towards
anti-discrimination law of UK, the most significant legislation is Equity Act 2010. The act has
been developed with a sole purpose that is the prevention of discrimination. Before this act,
many other legislations were there to resolve the matters related to discrimination at the
workplace. In the development of this act, nine legislations has been harmonized such as
Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006, the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, the Equal Pay
Act 1970 and six others (Equalityhumanrights.com, 2010).
Apart from the mentioned aspects, these laws also provide provisions related to trade unions.
Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 is one of the important employment
legislation of UK. Trade unions can be understood as an organized association of
employees/workers in a trade or group of trades that protect the rights of workers. These unions
are there to make the relationship between employer and employees smooth. These laws
applicable throughout the UK. Further, for the welfare of employees too, these employment
works in an appropriate manner. For each kind of possible breach of provisions of these laws,
penalties are there to impose.

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Equity Act 2010
As mentioned above this act provides the provisions related to discrimination, this is the reason
that this legislation can be termed as anti-discrimination law. According to this act,
discrimination is an act of an employer where he/she treats one or more employees less or more
favorably in comparison to other employees. The employer makes such discrimination based on
personal features of employees that can be anything like age, gender, race, religion and so on.
The subjective act i.e Equity Act 2010 provides nine protected characteristics, based on which an
employer cannot make any discrimination with any of his/her employees (Sargeant, 2017). Apart
from these characteristics, some fair grounds are there. An employer can dismiss an employee
based on these grounds. The same is mentioned below:-
 Redundancy
 Capability
 Conduct
 Statutory requirements
Further, the act defines six kinds of discrimination out of which direct and indirect
discrimination are the most common kind (Legislation.gov.uk, 2018). The same is detailed as
hereunder:
a) Direct discrimination:- When an employer treats an employee in a less favorable manner
because of his/her protected characteristics, then such discrimination is known as direct
discrimination (Citizensadvice.org.uk, 2018). For instance, dismissing an employee
because of his/her religion comes under the category of direct discrimination.

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b) Indirect discrimination:- In an indirect discrimination, an employer places some policies
which are applicable on all the employees equally but has some nature that put the other
employees in a less favorable situation in comparison to others (Eoc.org.uk, 2018). For
instance:- By disallowing week offs of employees in the festive season can put many of
the employees in a situation of a disadvantage especially married employees as they have
more social commitments in comparison to others.
Rights of Employees
Employment law of UK provides many of the rights to employees that safeguard their interest.
These rights include right against unfair dismissal, right not to be discriminated, right of limited
working hours, family-friendly rights and many others. Here in the given case, the client will
have to deal with the right against unfair dismissal that is available to Jane. According to this
right, an employee can bring an action against the employer in cases of unfair dismissal. Many of
the cases have happened there where tribunal gave the decision in the favor of the employee and
held the employer liable for the unfair dismissal. Therefore it is advisable for employers to
dismiss an employee based on proper grounds.
Dismissal based on Conduct
At many incidents, the employee does certain conducts which force an employer to dismiss such
employees. These acts of employees are known as misconduct. Misconduct is a proper and
justified ground of a dismissal. Now the issue is to check that whether an employee is liable for
misconduct in actual or not. The case of British Home Stores Ltd v Burchell [1978] ICR 303 is
far significant to study which is related to dismissal based on misconduct. In this case, the
employer had doubt on his employee that the same has performed misconduct and he dismissed

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the subjective employee on the ground of his doubt. The employee further brought an action
against the employer and tribunal provided a decision in the favor of employee considering the
act of employer as unfair dismissal. In the process of appeal, employment appeal tribunal granted
decision in favor of the employer. It is a significant case in the area of employment law as the
same has set out certain principles. It was given in the decision of this case that at the satisfaction
of the following three conditions, an employer can dismiss an employer and such dismissal will
be treated fair dismissal. These conditions are as follow:
 The employer is required to have beliefs about the misconduct of the employee.
 There must be some grounds supporting the believe mentioned in aforesaid point
 The employer is required to follow a well-defined procedure of investigation before
dismissing such employee.
In a conclusive way, all these three conditions are known as Burchell test. According to the
decision of the above-mentioned case, an employer can dismiss an employee for his/her
misconduct even if there is no evidence which proves guilty of the employee. However, for
doing this, Burchell test needs to be satisfied. While hearing and granting decisions in the cases
of dismissal cause of misconduct, judges use this case as a reference.
In the given situation, the first two conditions are Burchell test gets satisfied. As the client has a
doubt on Jane and further he has grounds to believe that on her guilty. The reason behind the
same is saying of another employee Hillary who saw Jane behaving suspiciously and informed
the same to the client. In order to dismiss Jane, the client is advised to satisfy the third condition
of Burchell test first which required a proper investigation. Now the question is what proper
investigation is. This is to mention that the Advisory, Conciliation, and Arbitration

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Service (ACAS) has released some guidelines in respect to idol procedure of investigation. After
following this procedure, the client will be eligible to dismiss Jane. He can do the same even
without satisfying the Burchell test but in that situation tribunal can held him liable for the unfair
dismissal based on the pregnancy of Jane, therefore it is advisable to follow the procedure
mentioned under the law.
Workplace Investigation: ACAS Guidelines
These guidelines provide a procedure that an employer must follow while doing workplace
investigations. Some acts are mentioned in the guidelines that are required to be done by an
employer in the process of workplace investigation (Acas.org.uk, 2015). Firstly, he/she should
plan the whole procedure and then after preparing the documents accordingly. Afterward, an
employer is required to act in a fair manner while this kind of investigation along with following
the steps mentioned in the guidelines. In addition to the procedure mentioned in the guidelines,
some other aspects/acts need to be considered according to the situation of the case. The same is
mentioned as follow:-
 Right of Accompanying:- At many events, it happens that employee faces certain issues
while the investigation meeting. The same can be for any reason. For instance, an
employee may feel uncomfortable because of his/her personal relationship with the
employer. Language can be another problem. In the provided case, suspected employee
Jane is a pregnant employee. In such a situation, it is advised for the client to provide her
the right to be accompanied considering her physical health situation.

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 Confidentially:- An employer is also required to keep the confidentiality in the
investigation process, therefore he/she is required to carry such investigation in a separate
room. The same is also required for another reason, as many times, employees feel
offended in a discussion of an open room. In the referred case, it can be offensive for
Jane to be a part of an open area discussion as the allegation is related to the thief of
money that can defeat her reputation.
Apart from the above two acts, the procedure set out under ACAS guidelines is also required to
follow. As Jane is a pregnant employee, there is a high chance that tribunal can held the client
liable for the unfair dismissal based on her pregnancy. However, the pregnancy of Jane cannot
prevent her dismissal yet client is required to consider some additional point while dealing with
her in the process of investigation. These points are mentioned herewith:-
 The client needs to ensure that all the conditions of Burchell test are satisfied.
 In the investigation process, Jane is treated equally to other employees.
 All the disciplinary policies are applied fairly and consistently.
 There is no ground for Jane, which can prove the discrimination.
Gross Misconduct and Maternity
Firstly, to understand that there is one more kind of misconduct this is known as gross
misconduct. Gross misconduct can be understood as a serious kind of misconduct (Goschen, and
Eccleston, 2012). A gross misconduct refers to an act of an employee, which breaks the
trustworthy relationship of employer, and employee (Macdonald, 2008). In a general situation, a
pregnant woman cannot be get fired from an organization for any reason except for some
reasons. Gross misconduct is one out of such expectations. An employer can dismiss an

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employee during the pregnancy if she is guilty of a gross misconduct. Further, courts often check
that whether the act of an employee is a misconduct or gross misconduct because provisions are
different related to both of these terms. Under a misconduct, an employer is required to serve a
notice to the employee before dismissal according to the requirements of law or employment
contract but the same is not required to serve in the cases of gross misconduct
(Cartwrightking.co.uk, 2018). As mentioned earlier that gross misconduct is a serious type of
misconduct yet employer can directly dismiss an employee. In a summarized way this would not
be wrongful to state that in the cases of gross misconduct employer gets exclusive powers to
dismiss an employee including the pregnant employee (Maternityaction.org.uk, 2018). Further,
certain terms are mentioned in the law, in the existence of which an employee will be eligible for
maternity pay (Xperthr.co.uk, 2018). A dismissal cannot be treated unfair just because of the
involvement of pregnant employees. The provisions are made to grant remedies to the employer
in genuine cases so that employees cannot take unfair benefits of their pregnancies.
Conclusion
To conclude the report presented along with a letter of legal advice this is to be mentioned that
the client is required to be more focused while dealing with Jane. There are high chances of
being liable for an unfair dismissal. In order to avoid such allegations, the client is advised to
plan and operate an investigation process. In this process, the same is required to treat Jane in a
fair manner and to provide her right to be accompanied so that in future she would not make an
allegation stating that she was not able to take part in the investigation because of her physical
conditions. The client is also advised to carry out the investigation meet in a separate room so
that Jane does not feel offended. At last, the case is a related top thief but just because of this

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reason the same cannot be considered as a gross misconduct. Here client can close the matter by
providing a warning to Jane. In the presented report, many of the aspects related to
discrimination and unfair terms have been discussed. The client is required to consider all of
them and then to make any decision. He can dismiss Jane but before doing so he is advised to
ensure that all the compliance is in place and there is no ground on which an unfair dismissal can
be set out before tribunal against him.