This is a first! We are now well used to the annual increase in compensation limits which takes effect at the beginning of February each year - this year, for the first time, the review has resulted in a reduction. The reduction reflects the decrease of 1.4% in the Retail Prices Index from September 2008 to September 2009.

From 1st February 2010:

• The maximum compensatory award will be £65,300 (currently £66,200).
• Statutory guarantee payments ("lay off pay") will reduce to £21.20 per day (currently £21.50).
• The minimum compensation award for union exclusion or expulsion will be reduced to £7,200 (currently £7,300).
• The minimum basic award for certain unfair dismissals (eg dismissals for reasons of trade union membership or activities, health and safety duties, pension scheme trustee duties or acting as an employee representative) will remain at £4,700.
• A week's pay (for basic award and redundancy pay purposes), increased last October, will remain at £380.

The statutory rates for SMP, SAP and SPP are likely to increase in April however - the proposals are that these should be increased to £124.88, (currently £123.06) but that Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) should remain at £79.15. The weekly earnings threshold for these payments will rise from £95 to £97.

For further details, see www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2009/uksi_20093274_en_1

Previous plans (announced in our September newsletter) to scrap tax relief on childcare vouchers have now been watered down.

Instead of the previously planned abolition, tax relief will now be restricted to the standard income tax rate of 20% - thus penalising higher rate taxpayers, but retaining the relief for basic rate tax payers. Basic rate relief gives a saving of around £900 a year, or £1,800 if both parents claim. Parents who currently have childcare vouchers will not be affected as the change only applies to new entrants to the scheme from 2011.

The government still has to confirm how the relief on National Insurance contributions will be affected, and also what happens to voucher users who switch jobs.

For further details on childcare vouchers, see: /docs/guides/childcarevouchers.html

As expected, our current parental leave regulations (13 weeks per child, may be taken in one-week blocks only, must have one year's service) will need to be extended under the revised EU Parental Leave Directive. This gives each working parent the right to take at least four months' leave per child, but the Government may retain our current qualification period. The new right will apply to all workers including fixed-term, part-time and agency workers.

The new directive will be formally adopted and Member States then have two years to introduce this, ie by early 2012.

Parental leave is currently unpaid, and the take up rate is quite low. Payment during parental leave is left for Member States and/or national social partners (in the UK, the CBI and the TUC) to determine, so it would seem likely that this will remain unpaid, and therefore will not have a huge impact on businesses due to the low take up rate.

For more information on parental leave, see: /docs/legal/parental.html

A few amendments by the House of Commons as this goes through the parliamentary process!

A new clause has been introduced on the use of pre-employment medical questionnaires. In certain circumstances, an employer will have to show that no discrimination has taken place if a disabled person has been refused work after completing a pre-employment medical questionnaire and giving details about his/her disability. Such questionnaires will still be allowed, but care needs to be taken about what questions are asked and why, and in particular at what stage of the recruitment process they are used.

Minor changes have also been made to the wording of the provisions relating to 'combined discrimination' (discrimination on the basis of two relevant protected characteristics), the definitions of direct discrimination and harassment, and the new provisions relating to 'discrimination arising from disability' (replacing the existing concept of disability-related discrimination).

It would seem that a compromise on the requirement for equal pay audits may help in getting the Equality Bill passed. This was debated at length in the Commons, and was not amended, but one suggestion is that the threshold should be increased from companies with 250 or more employees, to those with 500 or more. This could then be lowered at a later date if deemed necessary.

The Bill had its second reading in the House of Lords on 15 December 2009. It may be further revised but is still expected to receive Royal Assent in this spring.

There has been a flurry of media interest in the Vetting and Barring Scheme, as newspapers published scare stories of parents who are not CRB vetted being refused access to schools etc.

Following a government-commissioned report by Sir Roger Singleton, entitled "Drawing the Line", some fundamental changes to the scheme are to be made.

The changes reduce the parameters under which people have to register, thus reducing the scheme's impact and making it more manageable. Activities with children and/or vulnerable adults are only covered if they are carried out "frequently" and "intensively". "Frequently" was defined in guidance as "once a month or more" but will be changed to "once a week or more". "Intensive" was more than two days in any period of 30 days and/or overnight - legislation will be needed to change this to four days in one month or more and/or overnight.

The report also looks at the issue of individuals, such as authors, who may visit a number of different schools in a relatively short period of time. The current legislation requires such individuals to register because the "frequent" or "intensive" test applies to the activity (ie the school visits), rather than whether the activity is with the same children on each occasion. The Singleton report recommends that these individuals should not be required to register unless their contact with the same children is frequent or intensive.

For further details see publications.everychildmatters.gov.uk/default.aspx?PageFunction==productdetails&PageMode==publications&ProductId==DCSF-01122-2009&

New draft regulations will make it unlawful to refuse employment to, or dismiss, employees as a result of them appearing on a blacklist (and also for employment agencies to refuse to provide a service on this basis). Individuals or unions will be able to claim compensation or take action against those who compile, distribute or use blacklists.

The Government plans that Parliament consider the draft regulations as soon as possible. If approved, they could be brought into effect early next year.

Full details can be found at: www.berr.gov.uk/files/file53734.pdf.

This is getting to be a regular feature of these newsletters!

Tier 1:
The Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) has carried out the first review of Tier 1 and recommended that all four routes of Tier 1 (General, Post-Study Work, Entrepreneur and Investor) should be retained. It did recommend the following changes however:

• that those with an undergraduate degree as their highest qualification should be allowed in under the Tier 1 General route, subject to high previous earnings
• that the points available under this route should be updated to ensure that only the most highly-skilled immigrants are admitted
• that the initial leave to remain entitlement under the Tier 1 General route be reduced from three to two years, with a three-year extension, subject to evidence that the individual is in highly-skilled employment.

The report is available at {HTTP:www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/mac}. The Government will decide whether and when to accept these recommendations, as well as the timescales for implementation.

Tier 2: ID cards for foreign nationals:
Starting this month (January 2010), skilled migrant workers who successfully apply to extend their stay in the UK under Tier 2 will receive an ID card for themselves and also for their dependants. All Tier 2 applications made inside the UK on or after 6 January 2010 will involve the enrolment of the applicant's biometric information (fingerprints and photograph). There are now 11 Home Office biometric enrolment centres around the UK and foreign nationals can book appointments through the UKBA's new online booking service or by telephone - for further details see www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/contact/book-appointment/

Tier 2 - IT workers:
In order to protect against allegations that a loophole in the intra-company transfer category of Tier 2 is allowing Indian IT companies to bring foreign workers into the UK, and pay them less than resident workers, workers in this category will need to have 12 months' experience (instead of six months as at present) with their employer before they can be transferred to the UK, and the category will be closed as a route to permanent settlement in the UK.

For more information on foreign workers, see /docs/legal/foreignnationals.html

Discrimination - religion or belief: it is fair to expect employees to undertake their full duties
The Court of Appeal has confirmed the previous Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) decision in Ladele v London Borough of Islington that Ms Ladele, a Christian registrar, was neither directly nor indirectly discriminated against, nor harassed by being asked to officiate at civil partnerships, or by any other aspect of her treatment by Islington.

Ms Ladele had asked to be excused from carrying out duties around same-sex civil partnerships as she felt these were contrary to her Christian faith. The Court of Appeal went even further than the EAT by stating that it would be unlawful for a civil registrar to refuse to perform civil partnerships, given that it is unlawful for those providing a service or exercising functions of a public nature to discriminate on grounds of sexual orientation.

This outcome is consistent with that of McFarlane v Relate Avon Ltd and confirms that employers should not be forced to compromise their commitment to equal opportunities to accommodate the wishes of an individual employee, even where those wishes are based on a strong religious conviction.

Discrimination - religion: costs awarded for false claim
A Muslim chef has lost his claim of religious discrimination against Scotland Yard.

Hasanali Khoja, a catering manager at a police station, complained that he was forced to cook sausages and bacon. He says that it was suggested to him that he should wear gloves and use tongs and that this made him feel "stressed and humiliated". However, a police employee told the employment tribunal she had seen Khoja eating bacon rolls and sausages.

Judge Michael Southam agreed to the Metropolitan Police Authority's request that Mr Khoja pay its costs, and these will be determined at a later date at a county court. The Daily Mail reports that these amount to at least £76,200.

National Minimum Wage (NMW): basic rate of pay must be paid, irrespective of premium enhancements
The EAT has confirmed that basic rates of pay must be at least the NMW even where the employee's pay is always enhanced by premium supplements.

In Hamilton House Medical Ltd v Hillier, Mrs Hillier normally only worked nights, and therefore always received 1.3 x her basic rate for nights worked midweek, and 1.6 x her basic rate for nights worked at weekends.

The original tribunal said that Mrs Hillier's basic rate should be at least the NMW; Hamilton House said that because she was always paid premium rates, these rates were her basic rate, and therefore there was no breach of the NMW.

The EAT confirmed that even in situations where only premium rates of pay apply, the basic rate still has to be at least the NMW. Where a worker is paid at premium rates, the total remuneration in a pay reference period must be reduced by the premium part of the payment before it is compared with the statutory minimum rate.

Recruitment: false qualifications on cv result in prison sentence
Kerrie Devine, a senior NHS HR manager, pleaded guilty to six counts of fraud by false representation after she claimed she held a degree in Human Resource Management and that she was part way through a Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development course when she applied for a promotion at Devon primary care trust (PCT) in 2007. She had been working as an HR manager at East Devon PCT since 2003.

She was given a six-month suspended prison sentence, ordered to pay £9,600 in costs, and also has to do 150 hours of unpaid community work.

This case is similar to that of Lee Joseph Whitehead, a former director of planning and service modernisation at NHS Stoke on Trent, who was sentenced to 12 weeks' imprisonment for adding false psychology qualifications to his CV.

The moral to employees is "don't lie on your cv"; the moral to employers is "ensure that you check all qualifications and take up full references - even for professional jobs where you would expect a high degree of integrity"!

TUPE: must consult even if no changes foreseen
In Cable Realisations v GMB, the EAT has confirmed that the obligation to inform and consult affected employees in a TUPE transfer arises even if no measures are contemplated in relation to the transfer. A breach of this obligation can lead to a protective award of up to 13 weeks' pay, but the EAT said that this should "reflect the justice of the case" rather than automatically being set at the highest level.

The Sentencing Guidelines Council issues advice to the courts on sentencing under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007.

Its previous guidance suggested fines of between 2.5-10% of annual turnover for a first offence. New guidelines, which are currently being consulted on, have removed the link with turnover, and suggest that fines will be "in millions" and will "seldom be below £500K". The courts are also advised to make publicity orders in virtually all cases - these require organisations to publicise the offence on their websites.

For further information on the Act, see: {HTTP:www.businesshr.net/docs/hasaw/manslaughter.html}

We've added two new "DOs and DON'Ts" - one on probationary periods and one on retirement. See: /docs/TPdocuments.html

We've also added guides to managing conflict: /docs/guides/conflict.html and probationary periods: /docs/guides/probation.html

And one new letter - inviting an employee to an appeal meeting following a refused flexible working request - /docs/lf/flex/index.html

It would appear that the recession is having a big impact on the amount of overtime worked, but this depends on whether it is paid or not!

In a report from Water Wellpoint, 72% of staff claimed that they worked more than their contracted hours, with 27% working late every day - they rarely received extra pay for doing so. Whilst this may be attributed to fear of job losses, the report found evidence of 'a strong team spirit', with people pulling together in order to cope with increased workloads which may have been caused by redundancies or budget cuts. A survey by Hay Group Insight reached a similar conclusion - 1/3 of their 1000 respondents said that their working week had increased, but 68% said there was no reward for this. 85% claimed to be working harder to help their organisations survive.

On the other hand, the TUC reports fewer people working paid overtime. Their figures showed a drop of 1.5% in the number of employees who worked paid overtime this summer compared to last year. Whilst this may not sound much of a difference, the drop in overtime paid out this year was £1 billion - (the total paid was £10 billion). The amount of paid overtime has fallen steadily since records began in 1998, when nearly one in four (24.8%) workers earned paid overtime.