Employment

In a nutshell

Employment lawyers guide their clients through the ever-growing area of workplace-related legislation and are intimately involved in the relationship between employers and employees. The divide between employers’ and employees’ lawyers is often clear-cut so bear this in mind when you pick your firm. Most will work either largely for employers or largely for employees; a few will straddle both sides of the fence. Usually the job includes both advisory work and litigation.

Disputes are almost always resolved at an Employment Tribunal, or before reaching one, and appeals are heard at the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT). The grievances leading to litigation fall into the following broad categories: redundancy; unlawful dismissal; breach of contract; harassment and discrimination. This last type of claim can be brought on the grounds of race, religious or philosophical belief, gender, sexual orientation, disability and age.

What lawyers do

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Employees' solicitors...

Advise clients on whether they have suffered unlawful or unfair treatment and establish the amount to be claimed. This will either be capped or, in the case of discrimination, can include additional elements to cover loss of earnings, injury to feelings and aggravated damages.
Gather evidence and witnesses to support the claim.
Try to negotiate a payment from the employer or take the matter to tribunal. If there is a breach-of-contract element to the claim, it might be heard in a court rather than a tribunal.
If the matter does reach tribunal, the solicitor may conduct the advocacy.

Employers' solicitors...

Defend or settle the sorts of claims described above.
Negotiate employment contracts or exit packages for senior staff.
Negotiate with unions to avoid or resolve industrial disputes.
Formulate HR policies and provide training on how to avoid workplace problems.

Realities of the job

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You quickly develop an understanding of human foibles. By their very nature employment cases are filled with drama.
Clients may assume your role is to provide emotional support as well as legal advice, so you need to take care to define your role appropriately.
Solicitors who want to do their own advocacy thrive here, although barristers are commonly used for high-stakes or complicated hearings and trials.
The work is driven by the procedural rules and timetable of the tribunals and courts.
The law is extensive and changes frequently. You’ll read more than your fair share of EU directives.

Current issues

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The appetite for redundancy exercises has not tailed off completely, and although not as strong as it was in 2008, many clients are still looking to make cost savings by restructuring, outsourcing or simply cutting staff.
There has been a rise in TUPE work as staff are transferred or outsourced by companies looking to cut costs. In cases where staff have been dismissed or made redundant, or have had changes made to their contracts, there has been more scope for proceedings.
Employers are more concerned than ever about their staff leaving to set up a competing business, leading to a rise in attempted enforcement of restrictive covenants and confidentiality agreements.
Some law firms have retained the services of a team of HR specialists or a dedicated hotline to deal with low cost, day-to-day employment queries. Many clients that have been looking to reduce their HR spend have noted the strong attraction of this service.
Many organisations have consolidated their employment legal spend by putting out to tender just one contract, and are now looking for a sole legal provider to handle all their needs. This has naturally increased the level of competition between employment practices.
Employment litigation has risen sharply as a result of a rise in redundancies. Workers have been much more willing to bring whistleblowing and discrimination claims to tribunal proceedings in a bid to force settlement claims from their former employers. Similarly, employers have been more likely to make use of disciplinary and breach of contract charges to avoid making expensive redundancy payoffs. Because of the depressed labour market, many employees have been reluctant to settle at an early stage and made bolder gambles about extracting higher concessions from their previous employer.
In response, the coalition government has proposed radical reforms in the employment tribunal process that would bar workers from being able to take out unfair dismissal claims against their employer for the first two years with the company. Ministers say it will improve what is a "costly and time-consuming" employment tribunal system. Employers naturally see these proposals as a good thing; trade unions are angry.
Those law firms with a successful track record in reducing costs, deterring claims against employers or winning at tribunals – and especially those that are willing to give an objective opinion on bringing or defeating claims – are obviously the most sought after.
The high average earnings and extravagant bonus schemes of many workers in the financial services sector has led to a spike in employment disputes as the recession bites. The Walker report on corporate governance in the banking industry and changes to the FSA code on remuneration have led to an increased scrutiny of executive bonuses and incentive arrangements.
Many companies are still leveraging the effects of the recession to make changes at board and senior management level. This has led to an increase in demand for advice on high-value contract termination work from both employees and respondents.
Businesses are still failing and this has reaped benefits for law firms with a strong insolvency/administration specialism.