VIDEO EXPLAINER: Consultation exercises – the why, the who, and the how
This free Getting back to business webinar was held on Thursday 7th May.
On this video, employment partner Edward Nuttman and Graham Vials went through what a consultation exercise is and when you are required to hold one. They then took you step by step through the process, describing all you will need to do to ensure legal compliance whilst at the same time being sensitive to the emotional and motivational impact on your employees and managers.
Related FAQs
If a business has been provided with a loan from 23 March on commercial terms, providing the borrower meets the CBILS eligibility criteria, lenders have been asked to bring these facilities onto CBILS wherever possible (e.g. where the lender is accredited to offer the same facility through CBILS) and changes retrospectively applied as necessary. Please contact us if this applies to you and we can review facilities and advise upon the potential changes that may be made retrospectively to the benefit of the business.
The majority of hearings are taking place by video or phone.
Court guidance has been issued on telephone and video hearings during the coronavirus outbreak:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/hmcts-telephone-and-video-hearings-during-coronavirus-outbreak
Where a Judge orders “teleconferencing”, it will take place using BTMeetMe, or video conferencing using Skype for Business or Cloud Video Platform.
All hearings are subject to the relevant jurisdictional rules and practice directions and usual court etiquette, including wearing appropriate attire and not eating or drinking during a hearing.
Electronic bundles of documents and authorities (if required) need to be prepared, indexed and paginated and sent to the Court well in advance of any hearing.
The duty is to inform and consult appropriate representatives of the “affected employees”.
Note that the term “affected employees” means those who may be “affected by the proposed dismissals or who may be affected by measures taken in connection with those dismissals”. The term extends beyond those immediately at risk of dismissal to include those affected by measures associated with the redundancies.
“Appropriate representatives” can be:
- The Trade Union (if recognised)
- (For any roles not covered by collective recognition) any existing standing body of elected or appointed employee representatives (if already in place)
- Employee representatives, who are elected specifically for redundancy consultation
- Be alert to the fact that guidance on treating Covid-19 may change with emerging knowledge/scientific data and this may require subsequent modifications to treatment.
- Critical care staff should support healthcare professionals who do not routinely work in critical care but need to do so.
During the Covid 19 crisis lawyers and the courts have had to adapt with hearings being heard remotely and with more electronic communication. It is clear that going forward, some of these changes will become more permanent.
The Lord Chancellor, Robert Buckland QC MP, has spoken last week regarding changes to the justice system following the COVID-19 pandemic and we know that there is a significant backlog of work that needs to be processed.
Firstly, 10 sites have been identified for ‘Nightingale courts’ which will allow for better social distancing. The authorities have suggested that it is a possibility that courts will need to stay open for a longer time or at weekends, to increase the number of cases that can be heard safely on any given day. This will enable more cases to be heard in a day and therefore a swifter outcome for your case. The standard of video technology will also continue to improve, with plans for new technology being rolled out across all courts form July onwards. The enhanced use of technology may result in matters being heard more efficiently, decreasing the time spent during each hearing.
HMCTS is working to expand access to audio and video technology to support more and new types of hearings. There has been an increase in the use of new and varying equipment over the lock-down period. With the appropriate systems in place, many more hearings could take place on platforms such as the Cloud Video Platform (CVP). Throughout July, the CVP will be more readily available to Country courts. There will be further hardware rolled out to improve the quality of video hearings, and there will be more efficient methods used to organise video lists.
The increased use and training of CVP means that witnesses and advocates may not need to attend court and could attend the hearing remotely. This will give you increased flexibility, enabling you to attend from your office or home. The CVP is efficient and simple to use, with no complex functions; making it user-friendly. This should make litigation more time and cost effective (albeit that there will be the cultural challenge of having less contact with your legal team or the court experience).