'It's A Way of Life'

'Victoria, it's a way of life'. Such was the plaintive yet patronising plea of MP, Margaret Beckett, in the face of the new regulations on MP Expenses. The poor lady has employed her own husband, Leo, since 1983 as per 'Personal Assistant' and she believes the new reforms stopping such arrangements will make potential MPs think twice about becoming one.

As I sat in the car, I expleted gently to myself on hearing the interview. Beckett is one of the Ministers responsible for bringing forward many of the new laws on employment in this country that has taken away a great deal of the power of an employer to choose staff according to its own needs. True, there needs to be greater transparency in employee selection and there needs to be a level playing field when it comes to race, sex and disability - I think all employers would agree with that, but much of the law is now getting far too onerous.

So why should MPs be exempt from their own laws?

The whole MP Expenses saga has revolved around this issue from the start, quite apart from them all feeding from a trough. Now we have Beckett trying to justify that the job of an MP is more than just any old career, it is a way of life. It made me cringe as 3 times in the last 20 working days I have got up at 3.45am to catch the first flight at 6.00am from Heathrow and in September I spent just 3 nights at home during the available working days.

I, as is Beckett and are all MPS, am in the upper quartile in terms of salary in this country, and it is implicit, if not explicit, that working hard is part of the territory and you have to make choices in terms of the balance you want in your life. You want to be in that earnings bracket, then working hard, long hours and being away from home goes with the territory. If you want a 9 to 5 job and no calls over the weekend, then choose something else. No one will think any the less of you for doing so and I respect all that do.

In doing this 'Way of Life' job that I have, if I were to employ an assistant I would have to show I have advertised the opportunity and given a fair chance to all people who apply against the criteria for the job I have mandated. I cannot just go and employ my wife to be that assistant without due process - that is the law these very people have created, and I actually think that is a good law. My wife would argue very strongly that I have chosen this 'Way of Life' and it is hard on us both sometimes but that is what we have chosen and we may have gripes but we would not choose another way to have our standard of living.

Then we get the issue around Capital Gains Tax (CGT) for MPs. Sir Christopher Kelly's recommendations have gone into territory that Legg refused to go and the Members Estimates Committee (MEC), chaired by Harriet 'Goody Two Shoes' Harman told him not to and that is into the issue of second homes. Kelly says that MPs should not be able to claim mortgage interest payments and should only claim for rented accommodation. There is an uproar about it already.

Just think about it. You come to Westminster with about every expense you could want paid for by the taxpayer. So you buy a home in London and watch the value rise as taxpayers' fund that home for you - not just the interest but the decorating, renovations, maintenance, cleaning, gardening, the TV, the meals your dry cleaning - every dam thing. Then, at your leisure, and as often as you want, you can sell that home, even buy others and sell them, as many times in a period as you like, and pocket the full profit, tax free.

Meanwhile, some clever MPs can live in a rented room and claim their family home is their second residence and get all the expenses paid on that including the mortgage - some go as far as employing their husband as well who may appear to be a professional porn watcher to boot. After all it is a 'Way of Life' and clearly it needs 'relief' from the stresses.

Bizarrely, in the ensuing phone in, members of the public began sympathising with MPs who no longer can employ family members.

To my mind, an MP's life is no different to mine - you have to go where the work is if you want the money. I dare say they want to be an MP for a different 'calling' to mine and that's fine but don't try to make out it is a career that should be exempt from laws that all others have to abide by and that they themselves have made.

I mean, we don't want all officials to be like Baroness Scotland, do we?

Can A Grievance Be Avoided By Winding Up A Company?

Here is a case I heard about over the weekend and is one to vex the legally minded. I may not have all the specific details but the gist is interesting enough. No names, no pack drill, at this stage.

A company is one of 4 operating out of the same building and has at least one director common with all the others, the MD. The company has raced into the recession with all graphs pointing up and is very bullish about its future and so has been taking on staff. The inevitable happens and a brick wall is hit as the recession takes over and so the company figures have a massive and sudden decline. A first step is taken to reduce staff and the MD fires a few people for lack of performance.

Within a quarter, the situation has further deteriorated dramatically. The company has lost half its sales within the period and clearly a commensurate amount of cost needs to be reduced. Dismissal of a swathe of staff is actioned and the staff are 'made redundant' and the selection criteria is based around performance. The company has now reduced staff by 50% within a short period.

Of the outgoing staff, several raise grievances against the employer for different reasons and one female raises a grievance involving sexual harassment. To complicate matters, the officer who needs to answer the grievances is a family member of the MD. The pressure starts to build as the grievances are dealt with, and it is clear that the sexual harassment grievance is one which will not go away easily.

Then the MD does something 'innovative'. Due to financial pressure, he 'winds up' the company that employed all those staff. Under advice, presumably from a lawyer, he believes that there is no longer a company to answer any of those grievances and so all of the claims have to be dropped.

The 3 other companies in the same building are moved to a new building and carry on - in fact some of the remaining staff of the old company move too.

Grievances And The Law

As the details of the dismissals are sketchy, it would be wrong to assume that there was anything untoward happening. Dismissal by redundancy is perfectly allowable under law if a company is not doing well financially. I have argued previously that many companies use redundancy the wrong way in order to 'clear out dead wood' and not focus on the job roles which need to be lost and this becomes the source of many grievances in a situation where redundancies are made.

In an earlier, comprehensive article on redundancy, I highlighted that redundancy should be about making the role redundant due bad finances in the first step. After deciding which roles can be done without, then you start applying objective and fair criteria to the people occupying such roles, particularly if they are many who occupy such roles but only a proportion have to go. Using performance based criteria as an objective measurement for distinguishing which individuals should be made redundant is a potential minefield, particularly if it is the major or only criteria used but also if due management procedure has not been implemented - by that I mean there should have been regular performance reviews documented for all such staff, proper targets set and that all staff have been treated equally under the process.

It could be too easy under such criteria for an affected employee to argue that they were not given the same opportunities as others, or there were extenuating circumstances like a recession or their main customer also suffered a downturn. This latter one becomes a spiral argument - if the company experiences tough times due a major client experiencing a tough time because of a recession as its customers are experiencing a tough time, it is rather stupid to assume the employee could be successful in such an environment and so merely making someone redundant in a recession due to performance becomes a real minefield. Can they be blamed for a recession? Should management have anticipated this beforehand and done something about it?

It easy to see why this company had grievances raised by using performance as a major criterion in making staff redundant. However, the allegation of sexual harassment takes centre stage. This a grievance that has legs and cannot be dismissed easily. Most lawyers start salivating at the prospect of such a case as, if there is a genuine basis to it, it comes with a pathway to unlimited compensation in the eyes of a tribunal.

In this instant, against overwhelming pressure from the grievances, the MD took the step to wind up the company all the complaining staff had worked for and then retrenched his activities on his 3 other companies of which he was a director. By doing so, he effectively killed off the entity against which the former employees had a complaint and so there is no entity to answer the complaint. Game over.

Or is it? In my own comprehensive article on redundancy, in which I argue that redundancy should be the point of last resort for companies managing a recession-affected business, there is an assumption that grievances have to be answered by all companies. But what if a company ceases to exist? Do, in its cessation, all outstanding grievances become null and void? It is hard to get any information on this on the web and so it is clearly a rare subject.

Thinking logically, there are many people who have been made redundant and their employer then goes bust. In such cases, pay outs can be as little as nothing because there is literally no money in the pot left to pay any salaries for anyone. Directors have a habit of rising phoenix-like from the ashes of folded companies and starting again - in fact, there are many 'pre-packs' offered by accountancy firms which allow companies to do this with almost impunity to rid themselves of creditors in a very questionable way, almost over night.

If that can be done with ease, what happens to outstanding grievances? In one way, grievances are potential 'creditors' and so any dispersal of assets in liquidation needs to account for this - or do they? It seems a very convenient and easy method for a company to rid itself of troublesome grievance cases, particularly if they are ones which are likely to be heard sympathetically by any tribunal and may award compensation to the claimants.

And what happens to the directors of the company in question? In winding up a company and carrying on in others, do the directors conveniently deflect the complaints also? Finally, in the case of sexual harassment, the most serious of the complaints in the eyes of the law, does the named individual in the complaint also evaporate when the company is wound up, even if the person named is not a director?

I do not have the answers to those questions. I would appreciate comments and insight from those who have understanding and expertise in these areas or from those who have experienced the same. I will also keep everyone informed as this is the first case I have seen where a company has rather cynically tried to rid itself of its responsibilities to treat staff being made redundant fairly by deliberately winding up a company and carrying in others.

It seems too easy and, having been involved as witness in an industrial tribunal involving sex discrimination, I know that individuals and not the company per se, have to answer to the charges. My suspicion is that this action does not mitigate an individual's responsibility when it comes to sexual harassment.

But I may be wrong.

The Answer To The Question

As I alluded to, life is not that simple. Three aspects of the law come into play in this situation.

Firstly, it is unclear what the ownerships between the company wound up and the other companies are. I suspect that one of the 3 other companies is either the whole or majority shareholder in the wound up company and if so liability for all grievances simply transfers up the chain.

Secondly, if any of the remaining staff of the wound up company have been absorbed into any of the other companies which involves the transfer of business undertakings like servicing a client base, then the laws of TUPE (Transfer of Undertakings) comes into play and again all current claims against the company by former employees have to be listened to in the same way as before.

Finally, as I thought, any claim involving sexual harassment or discrimination names individuals and can be claimed on an individual even if the company no longer exists.

Redundancies - They Aren't Big And They Aren't Clever

So the recession has caught you out. For whatever reason, you did not see this coming, denied it could effect you, the global market conditions changed in an instant or all of those things and the result is that you have to drastically cut costs. So that's it - people have to go.

We can can go on and on about the appalling lack of planning by companies in the lead up to the obvious effects of the recession but let's park that there for a while. Sales have dropped, costs are too high - you need to drastically re-align. Redundancy is one of the major options - for many small firms payroll is easily the largest overhead and so it has the biggest effect if cut.

Firstly, I would make this point. Lack of planning is a mortal sin - the results of which are things like redundancy. So my point is that as a management technique it should be the place of last resort because it is neither a good reflection on your company or on you as individual managers. The stigma of redundancy is all too quickly transferred to the individuals who get their notice and join the dole queue. In my book, the stigma should lie with the managers who caused it due to their incompetence.

Secondly, redundancy is all too often applied as some sort of way to weed out poor performers or people not liked or trusted by management. Many managers use it as a tactic to clear the decks and settle minor scores with individuals they do not like. Once again, redundancy as a management tool is neither a big or a clever thing to do. Unless it is done for the right reasons and in the right way, it will almost certainly cost more than the numbers say.

Thirdly, often redundancies are triggered by the abdication of bullish managers of their responsibilities. Sales orientated directors are classic examples of good managers when the graphs point up, the moment they point down they let the cost cutting people from finance take over. From here, decisions are based on numbers - it will take the loss of 10 of those sorts of people to save £X,000 in the short term - go do it. Naturally, unless they have a department participating in the process, they will not be the managers who have to sit across the table and watch people deflate in front of them as the news is given.

I have had to endure watching a grown man cry and his manager plead with me not to make the person redundant - and while I have had to do it again since, the memory of that first time still haunts me to this day. And so it should with any manager who resort to redundancy to manage their business. Making people redundant is an admission of failure.

Redundancy - The Reality

The first obvious mistake small to medium size companies (SME) make is that they view redundancy as a management tool - it is a chance to get rid of specific individuals. The process of redundancy is in fact all about making the SPECIFIC ROLE redundant to the organisation, as a direct result of a management review in the face of a crisis in the business. That role is no longer required and the associated cost can be saved. So 5 people have to go in the sales department and the sales manager immediately writes down the 5 individuals who should go. Wrong.

The first thing that should happen is a review of the roles and what is required. Then the specific roles which are no longer required should be identified. Lastly, you should then see how many of those roles actually exist and then start using objective criteria to apply to ALL people in those roles.

When you start manufacturing the criteria to fit an individual you are not making the role redundant, you are making a specific individual redundant who happens to occupy that role.

Here comes the first reason why redundancy is not clever - because it is a form of dismissal. Too often managers use redundancy as a cloak for dismissing individuals who they either don't like or they think aren't performing well. The moment you go down the performance route you are entering rugged and treacherous territory. How do you apply performance criteria fairly? Over what period? Against what benchmark? How does everyone else stack up? The only way you can do this rigorously and fairly is to have had rock solid performance criteria already in place against which you do thorough and regular reviews with actions arising agreed by all parties.

In other words, it presupposes you have good HR governance already in place.

If you suddenly spring performance as a reason and you haven't been managing against it previously, then you are wide open for attack. Remember, redundancy is not a clever way to manage a business - this will be a creeping theme which I will return to and not allow managers to get a away with. Making people redundant is a direct consequence of managers failing to manage properly - so the process of making people redundant as a result of it will almost certainly be itself flawed. It is very rare that the individual actions or lack of will have caused the overall bad performance of the company - redundancies are usually made because the business has not reacted to market changes.

Already, an individual might claim that there was little they could have done personally to have prevented overall bad figures.

Recently, an SME company I know made a significant proportion of its staff redundant. The MD told me that he had no regrets as those who were given their leaving orders were poor performers, and were front line salespeople in the main which stood to reason. A few days later he received official notifications of grievances by some of the people made redundant, two of them cited grounds for sexual harassment and sexual discrimination.

The recent reforms of Employment Law since October 2006 have created a minefield for HR governance and there is no doubt that it is significantly harder to dismiss employees without due process and for anything other than the right reasons. To many managers, they see this as unnecessary protection of poor performing employees while others would argue that if the managers do not manage properly then they deserve to be brought to book. In the case of the company I have used as an example, clearly there had been a lack of due management process in managing performance generally and then as applied to the redundancy process - the redundancies were used as a cheap way to performance manage in the extreme. In the process, poor HR governance and lack of proper procedure on performance reviews has left the company wide open to the suggestion that criteria other than performance was used in the process of selecting who would be made redundant.

It is a legal gold mine and there are plenty of lawyers out there willing to take up the challenge in such situations.

The grievance process is also very strict and time consuming and by no means conclusive. While the company may rule that there was no suggestion of wrongful criteria used or that there was dubious conduct by management, lawyers can see things very differently. And while compensation for cases upheld are generally capped, when there is a whiff of sex or race discrimination involved, compensation is open ended and unlimited. Lawyers just love it.

Compromise Agreements

It has become fashionable lately, thanks to the bullish behaviour of US companies who have 'Fire at Will' clauses in all their contracts of employment in the States and so their executives struggle with onerous European laws, to use a Compromise Agreement as a form of dismissal and sometimes to replace redundancy. The essence of the Compromise Agreement is that the company acknowledges it has either not gone through the full due process but wants to get rid of the employee just the same or that it knows that there is a chance that the decision could be questioned and so in signing it, the removed employee effectively waives any right to protection from the law. In return, the settlement for leaving is generally a compromise between what could be claimed legally as compensation and what the company want to pay. It must allow for the employee to have the Agreement reviewed by a lawyer and usually there is a specific allocation of money as part of the Agreement to cover such a review. Once signed, the employee accepts the money on the terms of the Agreement solely and usually they will have restrictive covenants on working at direct competitors and strict confidentiality on revealing the details of the compensation to any other parties.

The Compromise Agreement generally involves an element of tax free money which is handy for both parties and so it typically can approach where a Tribunal might fix the compensation unless, of course, either race or sex allegations are involved.

Redundancy, by contrast, is a relatively low cost method of removing people from the organisation and this makes sense as if a company is truly in trouble and needs to resort to redundancy then it would be pointless to make it high cost. This is why managers get so tempted to abuse the process. In their minds, if they go above the statutory redundancy terms then they should make the leaving package sufficiently generous as to avoid scrutiny by either the employee or any lawyer. The fact is, the moment a manager steps outside the normal redundancy costs then an alarm bell should go off. What are they up to?

Many large firms give quite generous redundancy terms and this is usually as they can account for them differently and take them as one off charges to the business and not interfere with their operating margins in the accounts. BT is rumoured to be taking charges as write offs and 'restructuring' of around £1.5 bn but it will try to demonstrate that underneath is a still healthy business by separating this cost out. However, the astute amongst us will just think that their profitability has been overstated for a period.

For SMEs, of course, redundancy cost itself is nothing other than a direct cost. There may not be vast reserves of profit and cash swilling around and so each redundancy is a direct incremental cost initially while the saving comes a while later. This means, that every SME resorting to redundancies would be absolutely suicidal to not use good HR governance and proper due process.

Redundancy Processes and Options

A) Avoiding Redundancies

1) Non Compulsory Redundancies

There are many sources of good information on how and why to make people redundant and what the process should be. Of course, the first thing you should realise is that redundancy does NOT have to be brought about just because the business is doing badly - in fact this is not generally a good reason for this. The more viable reasons are that the business ceases to operate, relocates to beyond a certain distance or due to the introduction of new working practices or technology as a direct result of which specific job roles are rendered redundant. So when making people redundant purely to SAVE costs you are already entering a shady area which can be made far worse if proper due and fair process is not accurately followed.

Once again, prior business planning should avoid redundancy and one aspect of that should be communication to employees. Nothing hurts a company more than a sudden bolt from the blue, 'Sales have dropped, we are making redundancies'.

It would be far better if the first step could be to announce something like, 'The business is not performing well, management have anticipated a downturn which will affect sales and profit which will result in a specific shortfall in the region of £xxxx and are considering actions to take in order to save the equivalent sum in cost. So management invites cost cutting suggestions by staff, some of which that you might like to ponder are:

a) Reduced working hours for a period
b) Lay offs for a period
c) Reduced pay or a foregoing of any pay rises or bonuses for an unspecified period
d) Voluntary redundancies.'

You may be very surprised that by joining staff into the problem they actually may come up with the solutions - some of which you may have thought of and desired, others which are fresh thinking. Either way, you have prepared the ground ahead.

The outcome of such an involvement of staff may still not get you to where you need to go, but what you can quickly gauge is the APPETITE of the employees to accept drastic action or not. For example, if employees are not happy about the thought of redundancies then they may say that they would accept a selection of other things. Immediately, it is not only pointing to a potential course of action and solution, but it may help alleviate any repercussions of dissenters as you can legitimately claim that you had consulted people and your actions were using the suggestions made.

If you have planned so badly that such a communication exercise is not viable due to time constraints, you can still come up with a range of selections and communicate them but always put the figure you are looking to attain. Giving staff no view of the target savings does not allow them the chance to come up with alternative suggestions which will add up - also make sure they are fully aware of what would happen if the cost savings are not met and the timescales involved.

One of the most powerful ways to avoid nasty action and repercussions is to ask for non-compulsory or voluntary redundancies. You will need to craft a package which poses enough of an incentive for some staff to take it. As an advantage, usually the types who accept voluntary redundancy are the sort of people who would leave if they got the chance and it is a fair assumption to make that they will not be the most industrious types - they may be cynics who have been sniping at management for years or resistant to change. However, drawbacks could be that as such an option is not necessarily role related, you may find one of two of your best people leave plus it is generally a more costly option as long servers can take up more of the available pot. You can have a clause in there to veto certain people's request to leaving if it causes imbalances.

Here's the rub on this - if your best people do take voluntary redundancy then you truly know that as a management team you have not managed the company well. However, it can save a massive amount of back end costs for getting the process wrong and inviting lawyers in.

2) Get Rid of Contractors or Part Time Employees First

Why am I saying this? It's my lifeblood! However, the reality is that much contract, temporary or part time work may itself be redundant. You have to review hard what is required. The beauty of contract workers is that they are flexible and can be quickly brought back on board if things start to change again - it's a powerful way to avoid redundancy. BT has almost a third of its staff as contractors and that is both daft and useful. It means that they can make just 10,000 redundant and a stack of contractors. The really stupid thing would be to not make savings by ridding yourself of contractors first as a) it shows a lack of loyalty to your staff, b) you save less ongoing cost and c) you are showing to HMRC that the contractors are employees in all but name - so if someone is not paying taxes appropriately the alarm bells go off.

3) Stop Recruiting

Believe me, I have been in companies where this kind of crassness goes on. As a ton of employees exit from various parts of the business, other parts either are replacing ones lost through attrition or because there is a new business venture going on, are actually hiring. Of course, the first thing should be to stop all hiring as this also saves recruitment costs, the second thing should be to assess whether any of the outgoing employees are either suitably skilled or can be trained to do some of the vacant jobs.

Certainly, back filling empty headcounts is just daft without considering such options - it is also required by the law. And any employee identified for redundancy should have the option of reading the job description and having the choice to apply, then be properly assessed against the job criteria as any candidate would be.

If you are making an offer of an alternative job to an employee selected for redundancy it has to be unconditional and in writing - do not start changing the rules either just before or after they have accepted. Also, make sure the offer is made before their current contract end - it seems obvious but when their current contract ends they are actually redundant so they can claim the redundancy package and be re-employed.

4) Ban Overtime

This is self-evident. There is no point in people working overtime if it can save money.

5) Restrict Or Stop paying Bonuses

A moratorium on bonuses should be imposed. One of the really crazy things I have not got my head around in the management at banks is how they seem to think that certain people should get bonuses even if the company is losing money hand over fist. The perverse logic is that those individuals will walk. Yet as they were instrumental in clocking up the vast losses, it seems logical that they should be the first to go.

Management cannot see beyond their own stomachs sometimes. Bonuses should be at the discretion of the company. You can always defer them or pay them in a different, less costly format.

6) Adjust The Commission Plans of The Salesforce

Make sure the commission scheme is aligned to new goals and is appropriately geared for succeess and pays little for failure. As an example, reset the barrier or the point at which commission commences to be paid but compensate by having higher accelerators for over target performance.

7) Early Retirement

This may not be applicable to many SMEs but it is an option and one preferred by larger companies. It can be more costly than one-off costs as usually it means some larger contribution to the affected person's pension pot but again it avoids the stigma.

8) Exhaust All Options Before Choosing Redundancy

This goes back to the employee communication and suggestions - make sure you explore all options to save the cost first. Redundancy is a sad business and those affected by it often do not get over it while those managers who have to 'do the deed' can be very emotionally destabilised. The company PR engine goes into reverse, the competition and the markets get a bad message, you can have knock effects in the local area - it is just not a good thing so if you can avoid it - do so.

B) Compulsory Redundancies

So you have exhausted all of the above and you have nowhere else to trun. You are going to have to make people redundant. For SMEs, this may be relatively small numbers but it is best to try to follow the main procedures as, if nothing else, it affords protection. It is also standard procedure to use more than one criteria as by using one only, you are almost certainly going to discriminate even if you don't mean to.

1) Establish A Pool Of Identified Employees Earmarked For Redundancy

The pool can be as wide as you like or just one person.

2) Make Selection Criteria

These criteria must be objective, non-discriminatory and applied consistently. Here are some pointers:

a) Skills, Qualifications and Aptitude - this can be justified on keeping a good balance in the organisation.

b) Standard of Work Performance - Yes, this is allowable. However, this must be provable as an extension of a continuous performance assessment process, you cannot just invent it to suit the situation. You have to know, objectively, what is historic good performance and bad in order to prove your point. If the employees can legitmately say that such rigours have not been applied before or to them individually, i.e. no one has ever mentioned they have under-performed before, then you are leaving yourself wide open. This all needs to be backed up with documentary evidence, seen by the employee and stored on their HR records.

c) Adaptibility - Employees need to be assessed as to whether they can be adapted to do other roles in the company.

d) Attendence/Disciplinary Record - Stands to reason but again, just producing this at the point of redundancy is not good practice - the employee needs to have been aware of any problems beforehand and records show it - the reasons for the absence should have been explored as well. Obviously, don't be silly and include things like maternity, paternity or adoption leave.

Avoid automatically unfair reasons like being a union member and associated activity, being involved in industrial action, actions taken on grounds of health or safety, anything to do with pregnancy, maternity, paternity, adoption or parental leave and reasons relating to regulations on part-time work.

Think hard on all these - any one of them can be due cause for unfair grounds.

3) Redundancy Consultation

If you fail to consult employees (and their representatives if applicable) on redundancy beforehand, then you will almost certainly make the whole process unfair from the start. SMEs may not be affected by this but there is a process for making groups of 20 people or more redundant in one place of work in a 90 day period. You will need to inform the Department for Business Enterprise for Regulatory Reform (BERR) in writing or via the attached form and then consult with representatives of the employees in the pool of those identified to be made redundant. There is a formal process which is available at the Business Link website.

At the start of the consultation, you must provide written details of:
- The reasons for redundancies
- The numbers and categories of employees involved
- The numbers of employees in these categories employed at the establishment
- How you plan to select employees for redundancy
- How you will carry out redundancies
- How you will work out redundancy payments

Consultation does not have to end in agreement, but it must be properly carried out with a view to reaching agreement, including ways of avoiding the redundancies or minimising their effect.

While that is applied to groups, remember, for Individual Redundancy Consultation, you should consult employees individually regardless of the number you plan to make redundant.

If you fail to do so, any subsequent dismissals may be unfair.

4) Respecting The Rights of Redundant people

Redundant employees have a number of rights, the main one being the right to receive a statutory redundancy payment (SRP).

a) The right to receive an SRP

To receive an SRP, an individual must:
- Be an employee, i.e. partners, casual workers, agency workers, the self-employed and directors not working under a contract of employment do not qualify - here's a guide on employment status
- Have at least two years' continuous service
- Have been dismissed, laid off or put on short-term working, ie those who opted for early retirement do not qualify - check on this here: redundancy selection - non-compulsory
- A redundant employee also has the right to receive a written statement setting out the amount of any redundancy payment and how you worked it out.

You must make the payment when or soon after you dismiss the employee.

b ) How is an SRP calculated?

An SRP is based on:
- The employee's age
- The employee's amount of continuous service - up to a maximum of 20 years
- The employee's weekly pay - up to a limit of £350 where the employee's employment ends on or after 1 February 2009)
Currently, the maximum SRP payable is £10,500. here's an interactive tool to calculate the statutory redundancy pay due to your employee.

c) Taxation of SRPs

As long as it's not more than £30,000, a statutory redundancy payment (SRP) is not taxable. Any redundancy payment you make in addition to SRP is subject to tax and National Insurance (NI). You must be careful however, when you are making other termination payments to the employee at the same time, eg a payment in lieu of notice and holiday, as you may have to deduct tax and NI for these.

d) Failure to make an SRP

An employee has six months from the date their employment ended to make a claim for payment to an employment tribunal where either:
- The employee disagrees with the amount of the payment, or
- You fail to make any SRP, eg because you think that the employee is not entitled to it. If they fail to make the claim in time, a tribunal still has the power for a further six months to decide whether or not the employee should receive an SRP.

If you cannot pay, eg because you're declared insolvent, the employee can apply to the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) for a direct payment from the NI Fund. However, they must have applied in writing to you for a payment within six months of their employment ending, or applied successfully to an employment tribunal within the six months after that.

e) Other redundancy rights

Redundant employees also have the right to:
- Be offered alternative employment wherever possible.
- Have a trial period in the alternative employment without losing their right to an SRP.
- Reasonable time off on full pay for job-hunting or to arrange training.
- Not be unfairly selected for redundancy. Employees normally need at least one year's service to claim unfair dismissal. However, if an employee is selected for redundancy on certain grounds, their dismissal will be automatically unfair and they do not need a minimum amount of service.

5) Alleviating The Pain

Redundancy is a bad thing - it is not a good experience for most people. It is very good practice, therefore, to try to help people after they have been made redundant. It is not compulsory so long as you have adhered to the above, but it certainly can help make the best of a bad situation.

Where possible, you should try to find ways of helping employees come to terms with their situation. The practical and financial help you offer will of course depend on the size of your business and the seniority of any employee being made redundant.

a) It is good practice to do your best to help employees find a new job.

To do this, you could:
- Contact the local Jobcentre Plus to find out about suitable vacancies or training.
- Set up interviews onsite for redundant employees. You could consider using a specialist outplacement agency - outplacement counselling and retraining is tax deductible in respect of all redundant employees, including part-time workers.
- Contact other local employers who may have vacancies.
- Offer advice on searching for suitable vacancies in the press and on the internet.
- Offer guidance on CVs, job application forms and interview techniques.
- Highlight the importance of being prepared to consider a wide range of jobs.
- Consider re-employment if business picks up, where this is appropriate.

b) You can also help with financial issues by:

- Providing clear information on the financial effects of redundancy - amount of redundancy pay, effect on pension payments and state benefits
- Pointing out the need for the employee to discuss the financial implications of redundancy with their family as early as possible.

If you have the budget, you could consider offering individual counselling. Alternatively you could train HR managers, if you have them, to carry out this task.

The Pitfalls

Finally, there is a heavy price to pay if you go about this wrongly - even if it is entirely unintentional.

a) Following redundancies, an employee can claim unfair dismissal if you:

- Have unfairly selected them for redundancy. This covers both where you used selection criteria that were - on the face of it - fair but you incorrectly applied them and where the criteria themselves make the dismissal automatically unfair.
- Failed to offer alternative work where it was available.

Employees may also be able to claim a protective award if you fail to properly consult with employees' representatives.

b) Unfair Redundancy Selection

An employee will have been automatically unfairly dismissed if you select them for redundancy for certain reasons and here's a comprehensive list.

Key to all this, and particularly for the company I highlighted earlier, is that if you are to go down the route of redundnacy or dismissal on the basis of performance, it may seem clear to you but the employee needs to have a fair assessment and comparisons with benchmarks and with others in similar roles. It has to stand up to hard testing and scrutiny.

The last thing is that if you have any 'skeletons in the cupboard' such as potential allegations of sexual harrasment or sex or race discrimination at your workplace then you need to tread incredibly carefully as almost from the start you are setting yourself up for a major downfall with terrible costs associated with it.

When you combine Unfair Dismissal with any of those such allegations you are seriously jeopardising yourself as the compensation is open ended.

The Costs of Getting It Wrong

There is no real rule of thumb here as cases vary. I was called as a witness in an Industrial Tribunal that considered the allegation of Unfair Dismissal and Sexual Discrimination by a former lady employee at a company I worked for previously. The preparation of the case alone absorbed an enormous amount of time and money but if you seriously want to defend such cases and win, you are going to need a Barrister and that escalates the cost. In this instance, the total claim against the company was over £480,000 plus costs for various reasons but the cost of fighting the case, and eventually winning it, cost over half that amount. It was a fair saving but it came straight off the bottom line and did not really account for the management time lost which included the time, travel and accommodation costs amounting to some 40 man days of senior executives.

The message is - redundancy is like any form of dismissal. Do it wrongly and it will cost you. Make it your last resort in the fight against the recession.

Please Note: I am not a qualified practioner on redundancy nor an expert on the law. The above is merely an opinion derived from experience and various sources. Please make sure you seek good advice and counsel on the subject and do not take the above as anything more than illustrating the complexities.

Sources: Business Link

LIfe on Mars

I woke up yesterday with that unnerving feeling that I had been transported back in time to the 1970s. Almost expecting to see John Thaw bursting into the door shouting 'Oi, shut it!', I turned on the radio to find even worse.

Solidarity

This is a word that had almost gone out of normal use yet the person being interviewed was explaining why his fellow workers somewhere up in Teesside had down-tooled and en masse had stopped working in 'solidarity' with refinery workers in Lincolnshire. Even worse, a second interviewee from Milford Haven who was a convener for the GMB Union explained that ,'This is nothing against our BROTHERS in Italy or the rest of the Continent.'

I had to blink hard and shake my head. Strikes, Wildcat Strikes, Secondary Strikes, Solidarity, Brothers - these were terms of a nightmare past of industrial mayhem back in the 70s which culminated in the two major strikes in the Steel and Coal Industry in which finally Margaret Thatcher broke the backs of the most powerful Unions and, in her own uncompromising way, actually paved the way for a more prosperous Britain. Sadly, in the process and in the interests of Free Market Enterprise, she also gave way to the systematic destruction of the UK's bedrock manufacturing base - a legacy that has hit us very hard in the current economic climate.

So What Was Going On?

At a refinery in Lincolnshire it was discovered that an Italian Contractor had won a sizable contract for work and had decided not to allow local, skilled workers to work on the contract but had instead actively barred locals from the jobs which had been given only to Italian and Portuguese workers who were being shipped in and accommodated. There were cries of foul play as there are Pan-European agreements on the rates of pay on such contracts, it seemed to say that these workers were being employed because they were cheaper or perhaps as 'blatant protectionism' by the Italian firm - a bit of latitude here as there were other foreign workers involved.

I think most people would have sympathy with the plight of the Lincolnshire workers - surely it would be cheaper, easier and more expeditious to employ locals rather than have to ship in and accommodate a load of people from abroad, many of whom would have difficulty with the local language but at least would not go hungry given the volume of local Italian restaurants and ice cream shops. It did not seem to make economic sense, unless there was a violation of the cost-base agreements.

The local displaced workers in Lincolnshire did what they thought right - they went on strike. Pretty soon, across similar sites in the UK, other workers came out in solidarity with the Lincolnshire workers and went on strike. It was the 1970s all over again.

The Issue At Stake

While the EU allows free movement of trade, people and labour across all member borders which is a distinct advantage in some respects, it poses major problems in tougher times. Unemployment in the UK has just reached 1.92m and is rising. Britain has a large workforce of foreign workers, particularly Eastern Europeans, who see the UK as a land of opportunity as they can come in and work for less while the UK Welfare State provides a safety net. Many have brought families or got married locally, which makes them permanently part of the British fabric. It was on a similar issue that William Hague fought almost an entire Election Campaign only to be ridiculed by the then boyish and knowing smiles of Tony Blair who claimed immigration and asylum were non issues.

It is another Hallmark of this Government that popular opinion and soundbites dictate policy and there is little attention to the long term problems which we face. Immigration and Asylum were ticking time bombs.

But now we have this. A blatant snub of UK workers for local work by foreign firms (the refinery owner is French) - and we are told by Union officials that this is not the only case. Perhaps, the argument goes that Britain needs to stand its ground. As it was often the case in the 70s, strikes came about at the worst possible times when businesses were struggling to survive. The last thing needed at that time and now, is workers withdrawing their labour - Britain is on a knife edge and anything that erodes its ability to do business literally threatens business for the future.

There is a real danger that if strikes continue, the affected businesses will in turn collapse - there has to be another way. Lucky in this instance, it's an oil company but they only need the excuse.

Enter The Government

The problem with soundbites, as Gordon Brown is learning fast, is that they can come back to haunt you. In one of his rallying cries, he pledged 'British jobs for British workers' which sort of rings of Protectionism but let's not go there as this is another powerful soundbite that GB is using right now.

So as the situation unravelled, people in Lincolnshire rightly turned to our PM who had uttered the words so stridently for reassurance. Sadly, Gordon could not take their call as he was busy preaching on 'Global Confidence' and 'Creeping Protectionism' at the freebie in Davos for the rich, the powerful and Gordon Brown (be patient Gordon, the riches come later in Non-Executive roles at around £1.5m a pop - trust me).

Instead, the riled workers got Pat McFadden, the Minister for Employment Relations, who sadly was doing more important things like moving house and therefore could only say that when GB had made this pledge, he had not meant to flout EU laws on labour. A fat lot of help in the situation and little wonder it did not mollify the growing concerns. He went on to say, 'What he's saying there is, I want to see the British workforce equipped for the jobs and skills of the future and that's precisely what the government is doing,' which also did not help.

At this point, Old Lefties felt it their duty to brush the dust off their Red Books and speak out. Hilary Benn, asserted that these workers were 'entitled' to an answer as to why they were not being used. For a descendant of that old left wing war horse it really was an insipid line, but then again he is an Environment Minister and the one thing you don't ever do in New Labour is rock the boat or have a conscience, just ask Clare Short.

Talking The Talk

The PM, still somewhere in Switzerland doing another round of desperate rallying calls for global unspecific action to help save his neck, said that he had no regrets for making his statement about British jobs for British workers prior to his non-election as PM. He explained, 'I do not see a reason for regret in that the action we have taken has meant that we are now putting in place measures to ensure that British workers can have access to the vacancies that exist in the system.'

'We are now putting in place measures.' Well that really explains it.

It sums up Britain under New Labour - it's been 10 years of talk and little action from which Britain has benefited. You take a look across the Britain and while we have been prosperous it has had little to do with our disposable income which has been eroded and while our pocket has been pinched for more and more tax, we see little tangible difference in schools, hospitals, transport, crime and although unemployment went down we had a corresponding rise in those claiming on grounds of long-term disability. Because we felt prosperous thanks to the equity in our homes, all this has been swept under the carpet.

When the PM talks of getting jobs for British people, he made the fatal mistake of departing from the New Labour tried and trusted plan - never make a pledge that can be measured by real people. Sadly, losing your job to an Italian brought in on contract instead is very, very measurable.

A Quantum of Conscience

Quantum Physics is a heck of a thing to get your head round. Central to its concept is that by viewing any particular event, the result is changed by the act of viewing it. No such thing as voyeurism at that level.

Quantum Physics - A Metaphor For Life?

Hardly - Quantum Physics underpins life itself. However, there is a parallel in that each new life, each existence, each death has some impact upon the earth that will forever change it.

I don't believe that to be a theory - it's a truism.

The benefit of being a particle is that it may not care what impact it had while at the macro level every life has an impact and so has a responsibility for creating a future. Either that is in producing offspring or just trying to make the place civil enough to live in, humans have a burden of responsibility like no other particle or animal to help create a future.

Corporate and Social Responsibility

This blog piece was prompted by a lively discuss on I joined on the IOD Forum on Linked In. A question on Maternity Payments which was labelled 'Have the Lunatics Taken Over the Asylum' which berated European Lawmakers for introducing ever more onerous payments for Maternity Leave. It's certainly true that such payments and Maternity Leave itself hits SME businesses much harder than larger companies yet the levels of payments are exactly the same. As a small business owner and a person experienced in running SMEs, I know how hard that cost can be.

The trouble with the particular argument, and it is a perennial concern, is that where does social and corporate responsibility stop and start. You see, at the heart of the question, unspoken or not, is why should employers have to pay for the new generation of children. Maternity in the Employer's eyes is often as a lifestyle choice and should not burden the company cost. In the thread of the discussion, one contributor asserted that the sole purpose of businesses was wealth creation which contributed to the greater good. Even a lady professed 'it was not a company's responsibility to bring up the next generation'.

I argued otherwise.

Evolution of Corporate Responsibility

If we take the assertion that businesses are there solely to create wealth for the shareholders etc then I would suggest left to their own devices, most businesses would try to obtain as much profit for the lowest cost as quickly as possible. Without any encumbrances like laws, most businesses would not have evolved from the 18th century. Over a long period, things have changed and for the better too. After all the riots, demonstrations, strikes, unions which did not always help us business-wise, we have arrived at a point where companies have a responsibility to earn their profits within a framework of law which is designed to stop doing it without regard to everything else. We have a minimum wage, we have Maternity Leave and allowances, we have Health and Safety Laws, we have Carbon Emission restrictions and lots more. Gone are the days of companies polluting rivers without recourse, gone are the days of companies killing their workers and other people by exposing them to toxic chemicals without recourse, gone are the days when a coloured person had to worry about discrimination.

Or have they? What the debate showed is that when it comes to cost and profits, companies should be allowed to earn their profits without any thought to their employees or the outside world. It took laws, lots of laws, over a long time to get us to where we are now and what we have learnt along the way is that companies will not take on such responsibilities unless compelled to do so. What we also know, is that companies will disregard the laws and responsibilities at the earliest opportunity if allowed it.

Corporate Responsibility in Practice

My father died of an industrial disease caused by exposure to asbestos which he inhaled having been compelled by his company to delag control rooms without proper protective equipment despite that fact the dangers of asbestos were discovered 30 years before. He was not the only one on that detail to die a hard and cruel death many years later fighting for his last breath. The only company he had ever served for over 40 years turned their backs and our family dealt with their insurance company who paid a nominal sum. That company turned in one of the largest profits in British corporate history last quarter.

That same company polluted its local environment and the spot where my father's ashes lie overlooks an unsightly black marsh where no wildlife thrives as it was a reservoir for dumping the contents of pipes - no amount of clearing up after the event has brought back the natural plants and animals despite the companies dazzling green logo.

In Alaska, my father commissioned the first oil down the pipeline from Prudhoe to Valdez and constantly berated his executives for lack of attention to safety and hazards - he had written several safety manuals in his old place of work. Despite that, a pump station explosion took a life and later a tanker spilt its contents into the waters around that beautiful place.

Did the company learn? No, in Texas a few years ago, a major disaster killed several people and the company was found again to be at fault. Yet last quarter it earned £billions in pre-tax profits.

At what price does profit come? And without the compulsion of law that company, amongst many, would never have changed because it found it hard to change even when compelled.

The Next Generation

You may think that I am using extreme examples to prove a case. Not really - if Maternity Laws were not introduced and enforced we would not only have less women in the workforce but we would have widespread discrimination against them - much more than there is already. Because if a female can justify that a company is not responsible for somehow playing a art in bringing up the next generation, you can bet your bottom dollar a man will not.

Here's a commercial take on it. Many businesses directly market to mothers and rely on them for profits, and many focus on young people to make money. That's simple. However, it is simple mathematics to work out that if life was not renewing itself, all of us would go out of business soon. So it makes commercial sense to support the next generation - we should be thanking women who take a career break to have children and encouraging them rather than discriminating against them and berating everyone for their cost. Yet even with laws, companies have a problem with it even though if women were not allowed to have that break then the economy would not grow at the same rate and the rate of births would likely drop - buying business a problem.

Just as with carbon emissions, companies do not see what that has to do with them. It's about that Quantum Theory thing again. We each have an impact on this earth and the bigger we get, i.e. companies, the bigger the effect. Companies have a huge responsibility to make their money the right way.

But We Do, Don't We?

Last year the top half dozen banks in North America paid out a collective $28bn in bonuses. This year one of those banks collapsed completely and the other has been bailed out by the US Treasury despite firing 72,000 staff. Greed is a very powerful opiate - it makes you think that only you are important and that wealth is king.

Corporates today at the highest level continue to behave without a conscience when they can. It starts at SMEs too. In the IOD thread a person struck the nail on the head and said that if he were running a small business now he would be very wary of employing women. Everyone thinks this a PC thing and laughs it off as a Brussels-induced hallucination - lunatics running the asylum.

We have moved on as a race thankfully. No one should get discriminated against for their gender, religion, sexuality or race - it's pretty fundamental.

How We Should Pay

Where I do sympathise with all my co-threaders at the IOD was that the amount that SMEs have to pay is disproportionate. As with personal tax, SMEs pay at the same scale no matter what their size but we all know the bigger or richer you are the more you can pay to 'mitigate' tax. But like most citizens, SMEs are soft touches - they pay. I do believe that within all the Corporation Tax and NI that employers pay some should be spent on supporting working mothers and that the great pool of tax out there should be covering SME businesses for these extra costs. One person going on maternity leave in a 10 person company is a huge cost to the business whereas one to someone like BT is trivial. And so the payments should be reflected in this and this is where the tax system can and should help.

Direct taxation has been the hallmark of this Government, forgetting its Socialist roots. I have no problem in BT having to pay a slightly higher rate of tax than my company in order to subsidise the hard hit SME in this situation. And should I ever grow my business to those giddy heights, I would gladly accept it the same way.

Good Behaviour

Without the framework of law, companies would earn their money in whatever way they could and ignore their responsibilities wherever possible. I don't have a massive amount of time for the 'lunatics running the asylum' in Brussels or anywhere else but I do believe without them, companies would have not changed by themselves.

Fighting The Recession - Increasing Power without Headcount

Being lean, mean, flexible and adaptable are all admirable qualities to have during a recession - but how can you achieve it on limited resources and headcount?

One of the problems of any business in tough times is that the market, and how to service it, is a moving target. Putting resources where they are required and when become crucial decisions to take advantage of opportunities or even shoring up existing business.

How can you be both adaptable and resourceful without an increase headcount?

Professional For Hire

There has never been a bigger pool of available, experienced, skilled and very willing sales and marketing people who are willing to contract and deliver results.

It is commonplace to hire in or outsource skills to do specific jobs whether that be temping at administration or finance, outsourcing payroll or accounting, IT, project work, cleaning, Management Information, web management, Telecoms or other functions. But it has never been vogue to hire in sales or marketing people to do specific jobs or for specific campaigns or projects.

But markets are changing. I have had the privilege to work with innovative skills companies like Theorem (www.theoreminc.net) who help companies who do digital online marketing to flex and scale their organisations on demand by having a vast pool of multi-skilled resource available.

The trick is to put the power where you need it and when you need - and pay for what you need.

The Issues

In tougher times, headcount is a heavy load. Further, flexing it is not easy. For every new head you need to make a leap of faith in terms of the role to fulfill even though the market may change rapidly or the opportunity is transient. There are associated recruitment costs, management time consumed in the selection process, potential guarantees of commissions for significant periods, employer taxes and then the potential back end costs if the individual does not perform or perhaps the opportunity passes by and you have to scale back. The responsibilities in law are rightly onerous and each new headcount is a heavy cost and responsibility. For small to medium sized companies, each new headcount or backfill is a considerable risk.

And what if the market changes and the resource you have just punted on is not actually what you need? Suppose you take on a Field salesperson and in 6 months you actually need a Telesalesperson instead? The cost of change is huge plus the time lag in the process for due procedure.

The concept of Professionals For Hire is having access to a significant pool of experienced people with a variety of skills and seniority to fit your requirements - as and when you need them.

Imagine having such resources available at short notice, pre-vetted for experience, skills and suitability, and willing to work on daily, weekly, monthly or specific duration projects and assignments. Not Interims but flexible professionals for specific tasks.

Advantages

• 'Pay As You Go' - only pay for as much resource as you need when you need it in a flexible way.
• Multi-skill availability - Have access to a wide variety of skills to pick which you need for specific tasks and when.
• 'Pay For Results' - It is easier to gear payment to success as these resources are far more orientated to reward for success.
• Mitigate costly guarantees and get access to highly motivated, results-orientated people who have everything to prove and much to lose.
• Mitigate onerous employee related costs such as tax, holiday pay, sick pay etc. Professionals For Hire are independent business people measured only on the time they work and the results they deliver.
• Decrease management time - these professionals are given specific tasks and require less management.
• Mitigate recruitment costs - screening has been done in advance and there is no cost for recruiting just time consumed in post.
• Decrease recruitment time - Professionals For Hire are available at short notice, it's their profession.
• Put the Power where it's needed and when. If you require Telesales first followed by Field Sales visits, get access to two specifically skilled and costed professionals to maximise results rather than hiring one person and trying to fit square pegs in round holes.
• Only use the resource you need for as long as needed - why hold onto resource beyond their period of worth? Conserve cash and costs by applying resource when you need it for the specific duration of the requirement only.
• Make your workforce more adaptable, flexible and powerful without all the associated employment costs.
• Be able to scale up your organisation quickly and efficiently to take advantage of market opportunities without the normal time lags.
• Be able to scale back your organisation when times are not so good without onerous employment responsibilities and costs.
• Put the Power exactly WHERE you need it - if your requirement is in Scotland or Germany and not the UK, have the ability to not only access resource quickly and easily when you need it but where you need it.
• Get market experience and knowhow fast and easily - Professionals For Hire gives access to a wide range of skills and market knowledge.
• 'Try Before You Buy' - one of the great advantages of having flexible, hired resource is that you can evaluate their skills and suitability at first hand and in the job. When you are ready to make the investment with better knowledge of the market opportunity, you will have 'field-tested' potential candidates

Beat The Recession And Be Ready For The Upswing

The economic news is not good with Mervyn King telling us the obvious and worse today. Many businesses are 'Hitting The Wall' and having seen their markets collapse in a matter of weeks not months. Think ahead to how you can conserve cash, cut costs but be able to pick off the opportunities in the market when they arise by scaling your organisation up and down as you need to. Be ready for the upswing which will come as we emerge at the other side and scale up to meet the new opportunities, faster and more efficiently than your competitors. Above all, make sure you take this recession in your stride rather than Hit The Wall and struggle, making hard decisions too late and after the worst of it.

Professionals For Hire is a reality. Call me for more details on +44 (0)207 193 2356.

Funfzig lashes if you please, Judge

Max Mosley is some guy. If secretly filmed in a sordid sex session with a bunch of dominatrix paid-for ladies I would wager most people would be horrified and embarrassed, and possibly shrink from public life. It surely would be difficult to look loved ones in the eye and friends too - and goodness knows about work colleagues and business associates. Wouldn't we? Or am I living in a different world?

Not so Mr. Mosley. He actually turned the tables and made the whole thing a breach of his privacy. That takes some chin, but then again he's from a family not short of sticking its neck out and indulging in something repellent to most sane and decent-minded individuals.

What Are The Real Implications?

It was a bizarre affair that you couldn't have made up.

When a key witness did not show up the Judge in the case, Mr. Justice Eady, invoked the Human Rights Act to support legal action against the News of The World which had published the story and film to effectively expose his moral shortcomings, an age-old right of newspapers. Former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer stuck with his old chum and said the Judge did the right thing. Interesting.

Mr. Justice Eady ruled that the paper had breached Mr. Mosley's privacy while he had taken part in a sado-masochistic sex session with five prostitutes, in the process falsely claiming that it had a Nazi theme - which confused all of us who actually looked at the thing. I wonder why Max and the ladies didn't speak in menacing West Wales accents - surely it would have had a similar effects or perhaps we should ask the Judge.

In fact Justice Eady claimed Mr. Mosley was entitled to privacy for consensual 'sexual activities (albeit unconventional)'. It seemed to omit the fact he paid the ladies for the consensual activities, but no matter.

Enter The Daily Mail

I don't have a massive amount of time for newspapers editors, I think they do regularly overstep the boundaries of privacy. But in this instance, frankly Mosley had it coming. Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief at the Daily Mail, at the Society of Editors annual conference contended most people would consider Mr. Mosley's activities to be perverted and depraved.

I would draw readers' attention to my previous blogs on Denial as a Coping Mechanism. Psychopaths use the power of denial to distance themselves from their actions otherwise they surely would be overcome by their enormity while we regularly use denial to cope with deal with bereavement or similar. Mr. Mosley uses denial to make us believe the problem is with a warped newspaper who think his privacy is more sacrosanct than his depraved activities.

Dacre rightly points out the particular Judge has 'Form' on such rulings and contends that he is effectively passing laws. Even the PM would have had to set out a bill and get it passed by both Houses, a passage which everyone knows is no 'slam dunk'. Not so Justice Eady, asserts Dacre.

'...one judge with a subjective and highly relativist moral sense can do the same with a stroke of his pen,' said Dacre. 'I would personally would rather have never heard of Max Mosley and the squalid purgatory he inhabits. It is the others I care about - the crooks, the liars, the cheats, the rich and the corrupt sheltering behind a law of privacy being created by an unaccountable judge.'

Do We Agree?

Clearly the power of the vote of motorsport's governing body for whom Mr. Mosley works, do not agree - they gave him a vote of confidence although it might be alleged Mr. Mosley was happy to have accepted lashes instead.

I do agree this has a an implication for newspapers and society generally. If we extend Justice Eady's judgement then we may never know if politicians like Mandelson, Mellor, Blunkett, Conway, Hamilton or others far worse are doing anything which we ought to know about. It does have implications - it's called trust. While sexual activities may be a private matter in general, if you are in a high profile position or indeed in any where your actions may be construed by others as odd, depraved or unusual, do not be surprised if you take a fall. This applies to everyone when you think about it.

But here's the rub. Max Mosley slipped out of the situation because he has money. A great deal of it. If an employee, whatever rank in a company, had a video of his or herself published on YouTube of even an embarrassing incident let alone sexually depraved act they might possibly be disciplined or worse if their employers got to know. While they might argue a breach of privacy, the fact is they took the risk knowing the repercussions.

As usual in life, just as Formula One getting dispensation to get cigarette advertising a special dispensation even when it is clinically proven smoking harms health and can kill possibly with a greater risk than driving an F1 car, money talks.

Conclusion

All senses of morals say that a man in his position has betrayed the trust of his employer, wife, family and friends but that doesn't mean a jot and it outraged a lot of people who cannot understand how he keeps such a highly paid, high profile, ambassadorial job in a sport we love - in year when we have a British world champion to be proud of.

It makes you think it's a sport, much like banking, that is unhealthily in the hands of very few people who make more money than we could imagine. Perhaps it's time they joined the real world and got some sense of values and perspective, then they may actually realise this wasn't about privacy it was about trust.

We Are All Equal, Just Some More Equal Than Others

Ageism is dead; Long live ageism!

We could go on for hours with these pithy remarks but how ground breaking is the news the the new Equalities Bill will finally put an end to ageism? I can tear up my gym membership and pour the Grecian 2000 down the drain - I can now look a prospective employer in the eye and say, 'I dare you not to give me this job. I have Harriet Harman's phone number, you know.'

But what is best about the new Equalities Act is that it is now legal for firms to discriminate in favour of females and ethnic minorities job candidates.


Legal Logic

I used a computerised Mr. Spock Test of Vulcan Logic on this part of the act and unfortunately it got a bit emotional and told me it did not compute. You see if you positively discriminate in favour of someone then in fact you have discriminated against someone else.

No, no, that's not what Harriet meant at all. What this actually stops is companies not just choosing from 'a pool of friends of friends' which is very rife in business as we all know - well at least in Government it is. You see when you positively discriminate in favour of a woman over a white male it is because the company in question 'Might think we don't want an all male team'. Very good point, if you have an all male team.

Right, so back to the logic machine. So two candidates with similar credentials and experience, one white male, one female for example. The Company in question invokes positive discrimination and chooses the female. So would the white male not think, 'Hang on a minute, she got the job because she's a female - that's not fair'.

Positive Discrimination, sound as it may appear, is one of those circular arguments similar to explaining time travel - sooner or later logic will go right around until you eventually disappear up your own backside.

But Harriet explains that we do not have to argue ourselves into oblivion. You see while it is now legal to positively discriminate you are not obliged to do so. As Harriet explains very clearly, 'The law at the moment is not clear and we are clarifying and saying if you want to do it, you can, and it makes it much more open.'

That clearly clarifies that then.

My Mr. Spock Program went into meltdown but before it did it posed a number of 'what ifs'. Suppose you have a female and an ethnic minority person going for the same job with similar credentials and experience? What if you have a significantly older white man and a female or ethnic person in the situation above? What if you have two females in the above situation, but one is gay or older? What happens if you have a female and an ethnic man in the same situation? The machine blew up at that point although the last output before it flickered off said, 'Why make this optional if you are sure positive discrimination is the right way to go?'

The Good Parts

It was not all illogical. The rest of the Bill deals with getting some sense into the wage gap making Companies more open about pay scales between men and women and that is a very good thing. Further, the Law will enforce doctors to treat pensioners who have been denied treatment because of their age, which is interesting as this seems to have inflamed in the last 10 years while the NHS has been bombarded with budgets and targets by the same Government. The caveat is that the same doctors can refuse the treatment on clinical grounds - would such a clinical ground be that the pensioner has less time left to live, I wonder? Even better though is that Age Discrimination will be outlawed in the holidays and insurance business. Quite where that leaves Health Insurance actuarial calculations I don't know.

But before you pensioners call Club 18-30 it's exempt. However, there is nothing stopping me being on your next Saga Holiday.

Are we Better off Then?

I have no idea. Certainly the Bill is unlikely to have been drawn up by anybody who employs people because it just seems so daft. Positive Discrimination is either right or wrong; making it optional is absurd. But more importantly, how on earth do you properly decide and act within the law? How similar do the credentials have to be to allow positive discrimination to be invoked? What are the repercussions if positive discrimination is used and it is subsequently proven all was not equal after all? Would the white male blighted by the decision have a case in law to claim actual discrimination as opposed to being positively discriminated against? Finally, why wasn't age included in the positive discrimination part - would that also have been logical if this was so much of an issue?

I can hear the Employment Law eagles tapping their calculators furiously as the answer is 'Billable Hours'. Hands up all those in Government who are lawyers by qualification! Quite a few - my, my is that not a strange coincidence.