If you would like us to help you with conflicts between your work and family life, contact Cambridge Legal on 01223 776200 or emailenquiries@cambridgelegal.co.uk. We are specialist Cambridge employment solicitors covering the UK. Family friendly rights in employment law are now extensive. The following is merely an overview of flexible working and dependant relief.
The importance of a reasonable balance between work and family life requiring flexible working practices is recognised in the law and by the judiciary.
“The ability of men and women to fulfil the demands of work and also to enjoy a family life reaps real benefits, not only for employees and workers but also for the general well-being of society….Working parents who can spend quality time with their children tend to be happier, healthier people, who are therefore more productive when they are at work.” The Honourable Mrs Justice Laura Cox DBE.
FLEXIBLE WORKING
What is flexible working?
Flexible working is about being allowed by your employer to adjust your working hours to allow for certain family responsibilities. It can include changing hours, the times when those hours are worked, and when you are required to work. Flexible working might include job sharing, working from home, term time working, flexitime, and staggered hours. The concept is wide.
Many employers already operate flexible working arrangements. A good starting point is to read your contract of employment and staff handbook to see what is available. If you have a contractual right to flexible working your employer must honour this promise. Regardless of what is written in these documents, the law provides certain legal rights.
Who can request flexible working?
If you have completed at least 26 weeks’ continuous service you have a right to request flexible working hours if you have children over 5 and under 17 (18 if the child is disabled) and for certain adults. The right is granted if you are a parent, including adopted or foster parent, or guardian of the child, or you are a partner or spouse, with responsibility for child upbringing. Caring for the child can include collecting the child from school or simply spending more time with him or her.
Where the application for flexible working concerns caring for an adult the person requiring care must be the spouse, partner or civil partner of the employee, a relative of the employee, or someone living at the same address as the employee. The relatives who are covered include parents, adopters, guardians, special guardians, parents-in-law, step-parents, children or stepchildren, children-in- law, siblings, step-siblings, siblings-in-law, aunts, uncles and grandparents. Adoptive relationships and relationships of the full blood or half-blood are included.
Caring in these circumstances can involve a variety of activities including nursing, help with personal care or household tasks, helping with financial matters, emotional support and keeping the person company.
This right was introduced in April 2003 and has since been extended. There is no absolute right to be granted flexible working hours but the Flexible Working Regulations 2002 that introduced flexible working make it easier for a person to request flexible working and to have it properly considered.
Applying for flexible working
Your application for flexible working hours must be in writing using a standard application form. Your employer then has 28 days either to agree to grant the flexible hours or to hold a meeting to discuss your application. Your employer must give a written decision within 14 days of the meeting. You have a right to appeal the decision within 14 days of receiving a written refusal. Following this, you have a right to have an appeal hearing within a further 14 days.
Only one flexible working application may be made in any 12 month period.
Right to be accompanied
You have the right to be accompanied at any meetings including appeals to discuss your request for flexible working. Unless your contract permits others to accompany you, the basic right is that you may be accompanied by a trade union representative or a work colleague. It is unlikely that you will be allowed to attend with an employment solicitor.
Legal remedies
You will have a possible claim of discrimination against your employer if you are refused flexible working hours because of a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010. For example, refusing to give a black worker flexible hours when in the same situation they had been given to a white worker might amount to direct discrimination.
Refusal to permit a woman or married person to work part-time or arrive or leave at certain hours may be unlawful indirect sex discrimination under the Equality Act 2010.
Breach of the Flexible Working Regulations 2002 gives employment tribunals jurisdiction to award up to 8 weeks’ pay or to order your employer to reconsider your application. This might include the failure to hold the meetings or to notify you of the decision or if a decision to reject the application is based on incorrect facts or an impermissible ground.
Compensation can also be awarded by the employment tribunal of up to 2 weeks’ pay if you are denied the right to be accompanied at the meeting to discuss flexible working arrangements.
There is a strict limitation period for claims concerning flexible working. You must bring an employment tribunal case within three months. If you want to be sure that you are in time, please take advice as early as possible from specialist employment solicitors, preferably Cambridge Legal Practice.
Subjecting an employee to a detriment because he or she has applied for flexible working is unlawful. Similarly, dismissing an employee because he or she has requested flexible working hours will amount to automatic unfair dismissal. If you have a potential claim it makes sense to take advice from a specialist employment solicitor on the next steps.
DEPENDANT LEAVE (TIME OFF FOR DEPENDANTS)
For the purposes of dependant leave a “dependant” means the spouse, civil partner, child, parent or person (other than the tenant, lodger or employee) who lives in the employee’s household. A dependant might include a grandparent or cohabitee.
You are entitled to reasonable unpaid time off to do any of the following:
- to provide assistance when a dependant is injured or assaulted, falls ill or gives birth;
- to make care arrangements for a dependant who is ill or injured;
- because of the death of a dependant;
- because of unexpected disruption or termination of arrangements for the care of a dependant;
- to deal with an incident involving your child which occurs unexpectedly while the child is at an educational establishment.
If your contract states that you are entitled to paid dependant leave then you will have a right to something that is better than the bare statutory right to unpaid leave.
Dependant leave is to deal with an immediate crisis. It is not designed to give employees the right to provide care personally to extend beyond dealing with the immediate crisis. If the dependant has an underlying medical condition that is likely to cause regular relapses, the situation is no longer covered.
Dependant leave because of the death of a dependant can include making arrangements for and attending the funeral, applying for probate and being interviewed by the probate office, but it does not cover time off for bereavement by way of compassionate leave.
It is your responsibility to tell your employer as soon as reasonably practicable how long you expect to be absent and the reason for this. You should indicate the nature of the problem and why it is urgent that you leave work. However, you do not need to provide all the detail of the circumstances. What amounts to a “reasonable” period of time will always depend on the individual circumstances. Your employer can take account of the number, length and dates of your previous absences but is not allowed to take account of any disruption or inconvenience caused to the business.
“As I leave the second most important job I could ever hold, I cherish even more the first – as a husband and father.” Gordon Brown
For legal advice on flexible working, family friendly rights at work or employment law, particularly if you are looking for specialist employment solicitors in Cambridge, call Cambridge Legal on 01223 776200 or email enquiries@cambridgelegal.co.uk