Good morning, Everyone,

Welcome back to this week’s MMD! In the podcast Sam and Nils discuss the Worker Protection Act in terms of Christmas parties. Daniel’s video covers the Government’s updates to statutory rates, including sick pay, maternity/paternity rates and the national living wage. In the news, a banker wins a landmark sex discrimination case relating to paternity leave policies.

THE MMD PODCAST

Episode 48: Two Christmas Grinches

In this week’s episode Sam discusses the Worker Protection Act and how to ensure your Christmas party is still a success whilst Nils talks us through what to do if things do go wrong.

Listen to the episode: https://bit.ly/3Zt8ROl

Listen on YouTube: https://bit.ly/4g2x2dO

THE MEDIA HUB

Statutory Rate Increases Announced

Government has announced changes to various statutory rates which will take effect on 1 April 2025. We cover these changes which relate to sick pay, maternity/paternity rates and national living wage, as well as commenting on the future proposals to lower the NLW age thresholds.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/aTb2DRTMTzM

Banker fired on his Return from Paternity Leave Wins Sex Discrimination Case

A former vice-president of Goldman Sach’s London compliance department was successful in his sex discrimination tribunal case.

Jon Reeves, who had worked at the bank since 2007, was dismissed from his role after returning from his six-month long paternity leave in 2022.

Whilst the firm argued that he had been fired for performance reasons, the Tribunal heard that the firm disapproved of male staff taking extended leave for childcare purposes. Reeves told the hearing how he took six months of paternity leave from November 2021 until May 2022, but was dismissed by reason of redundancy in September 2022. He argued that what happened to him would not have happened to a woman at Goldman Sachs. The Tribunal ruled in favour of his argument, finding that he had been discriminated against on the grounds of his sex and that no attempt had been made to carry out a fair process before dismissing him.

Reeves claimed that he had raised concerns that he was struggling to balance work and parenthood, but was told “You’re a grown man, you can sort this out”. He also claimed that Sachs bosses were “more empathetic towards female employees in relation to childcare”. The Tribunal held that Reeves had been treated unfairly on the grounds of his sex, ruling that Sachs subjected him to sex discrimination by alleging that he had performed worse than his peers, reducing his renumeration and sacking him.

Whilst Sachs has argued that it is deeply committed to supporting working payments and maintained throughout the hearing that Reeves was selected for redundancy because of his performance, and not because of his sex, the Tribunal unanimously ruled that Sachs unfairly dismissed Reeves and discriminated against Reeves on the grounds of sex. The Tribunal will determine the payout at a remedy hearing in the new year.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Our seminars and events have finished for 2024. Keep an eye on our website for the release of our 2025 Seminar Programme coming soon!

 https://www.chadwicklawrence.co.uk/seminars/business-services-seminars/

MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS SESSIONS

Through our relationship with Tailored Learning Solutions who provide mental health first aid courses in our business, we are now able to announce that we are running multiple courses at our Wakefield office including the following:

• 23 and 24 April 2025
• 25 and 26 June 2025
• 24 and 25 September 2025

The details of these sessions can be found at the Tailored Learning Solutions website: https://www.tailoredlearningsolutions.co.uk/book-online?category=all-services

If you would like further information and details of the cost for these events, please email carolgledhill@chadlaw.co.uk