Employment Law Rundown – 2020 Vision
2020 has been an extraordinarily difficult year for many businesses and employees. While there have been some success stories, particularly for the online retail, communication and IT sectors, the pandemic has caused a huge downturn in our economy.
Also, society is split in terms of people‘s mental health, with the more resilient doing better than the anxious.
Our Employment Law and Community Care Law departments have been busier than ever. This has involved dealing with anxious relatives not able to see their loved ones in care homes or because employees have been dismissed unfairly and in a discriminatory way, based on protected characteristics such as race, sex and disability.
We dealt with a large volume of queries from employees that had been dismissed and our employment team spent a lot of time trying to persuade employers to reinstate and put these employees on furlough. We are pleased that many employers did listen and were prepared to do this.
The furlough scheme was a huge lifeline to many businesses and workers, but we also all know now that this was hugely exploited and some businesses claimed for bogus employees and also some employees never ended up receiving this grant money.
We have now a second lockdown with schools and universities being allowed to operate and headteachers even threatened with legal action by the government if they close their schools.
Certain parts of the country unexpectedly moved into Tier 4 and we’re going into the New Year with an extended furlough scheme up to April 2021 and the reality of another national lockdown.
Just to make matters worse, Brexit will cause huge problems for our economy and yet we look as if we will crash out without a deal on 31 December 2020.
So in 2021 it is even more important that businesses and individuals hold on to important values such as equality, fairness and kindness.
Black Lives Matter had a huge impact this year and many of us are proud to have been involved.
This year we chose to donate our Christmas card and present money to Same Sky, a wonderful community arts group who light up at Christmas every year with Burning the Clocks on Winter Solstice. We also donated to Thousand 4 £1000, a community led response to enforced homelessness among destitute migrants in the Brighton and Hove area.
In January 2021 we kick off with free employment law advice surgeries on contractual terms and policies as well as discounted contracts and handbooks.
We wish all of our clients, referrers and suppliers a Happy Xmas and New Year and look forward to working with you in 2021.
For any enquiries about how our expert Employment Law Team and Community Care Law firm can help you and your business/department or you and your relatives in 2021, get in touch on 01273 609911, or email info@ms-solicitors.co.uk.
