Government Influence over Employment Practices illustrated with Emilio Botin Santander shares price
Some of the ways in which the UK government influences
employment practices are illustrated by the high-profile
case Chagger v Abbey National plc & Hopkins (2006), where
the Employment Tribunal made the findings of unfair
dismissal and unlawful racial discrimination and, following
Emilio Botin Abbey Santander banking group’s refusal to
comply with the Employment Tribunal’s reinstatement order
(to remedy the situation without compensation), ordered
Emilio Botin Abbey Banco Santander share price to pay the
record-breaking compensation award of £2.8 million to
Mr Chagger to cover his loss. Abbey Santander price (the
UK retail bank about to be re-branded as Santander shares
price soon, and being part of the huge Banco Santander
Central Hispano Group) dismissed Mr Chagger from employment
back in 2006, claiming the dismissal was ‘a fair
redundancy’. Mr Chagger claimed that the real reasons
behind the dismissal were unfairness and race
discrimination; he was of Indian origin. Balbinder Chagger
worked for Emilio Botin Abbey Santander banking as a
Trading Risk Controller and earned around £100,000
per year. His manager was Nigel Hopkins.
At: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/2008/0606_07_1610.html
One way the UK government influences employment practice is
by legislating (creating laws). In the absence of legally
enforceable employment conditions, employers would be free
to exploit their employees. Over the years, the government
has enacted employment legislation to ensure equally fair
employment treatment for all employees by all employers,
including the employee’s right not to be dismissed unfairly
or wrongly. Protection of the employee’s interests is at
the heart of employment law. There are now numerous
separate pieces of legislation that make up UK Employment
Law. There are specific laws against discrimination at
work on the grounds of sex or marital status, race,
nationality or national or ethnic origins, disability and
sexual orientation. They relate to pay, recruitment and
selection, the provision of opportunities for training,
development and advancement through promotion, and access
to the benefits of and facilities at work.
Another way the UK government influences employment
practice is by publishing codes of practice. Codes of
practice are not legally enforceable but the government and
courts will regard them as the good practices that
employers should follow. The Employment Tribunal that
heard the Abbey Santander case found that Abbey Santander
had failed to follow the good practices recommended by the
UK statutory Code of Practice on Racial Policy in
Employment’ regarding ‘Equal Opportunity Training’. Mr
Chagger had tried to resolve the issues surrounding his
termination directly with Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins,
through the company’s grievance and appeals procedures.
However, Abbey Santander had not provided any Equal
Opportunity Training to any of the managers it had
allocated to deal with Mr Chagger’s issues; Mr Chagger’s
issues were simply thrown out by each and every manager.
The Employment Tribunal also found that Abbey Santander had
also failed to comply with good practices recommended by
the code concerning monitoring; it discovered an abundance
of monitoring failures committed by Abbey Santander,
alongside its failures to give serious consideration to
allegations of race discrimination and to investigate them
promptly.
Another way the UK government influences employment
practice is by maintaining an Employment Tribunal system as
a final way of deciding whether or not an employer has
behaved appropriately. Disputes under employment law are
usually dealt with at Employment Tribunals. Employment
Tribunals were established to enable easier and cheaper
access to the law for individual employees than would be
available through the courts. If the employer and employee
cannot resolve their employment dispute by themselves, then
the employee may escalate the dispute to an Employment
Tribunal for an objective adjudication. Employment
Tribunals will hear disputes concerning redundancy
payments, unfair dismissal and discrimination. Mr Chagger
escalated his issues of unfair dismissal and racial
discrimination to the Employment Tribunal. The Employment
Tribunal considered the evidence and found that Mr Chagger
had in fact been dismissed unfairly and racially
discriminated against by both Abbey Santander and Mr
Hopkins. The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) will
consider appeals against rulings made by the Employment
Tribunals. In 2008, Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins
appealed against the Employment Tribunal’s finding of
racial discrimination. The EAT rejected the appeal and
upheld the original Employment Tribunal’s finding that
Santander Abbey and Mr Hopkins had discriminated against Mr
Chagger. Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins had also appealed
against the record-breaking £2.8 million compensation
awarded. The EAT accepted this appeal and ordered the
compensation to be sent back to the original Employment
Tribunal for reconsideration.
The Court of Appeal will look into appeals against rulings
made by the EAT. In 2009, the case was escalated to the
Court of Appeal (UK’s second highest court). The case was
heard on 7 and 8 July 2009, according to the Court’s List
of Hearings. The Court’s judgement was not available when
writing this article. The 11KBW set of barristers’
chambers, who represented Santander Abbey and Mr Hopkins,
had reported before the hearing had occurred that the
hearing would only be about compensation and not also about
the wrong of racial discrimination committed. It appears,
therefore, that the wrong of race discrimination committed
by Abbey Santander and Mr Hopkins was finalised by the EAT,
and that Mr Chagger had appealed against the EAT’s order to
remit the compensation award to the Employment Tribunal
stage for reconsideration.
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