ICR 175 (HL) / [1994] ICR 720 (ECJ) - Pregnancy; dismissal; dismissing a woman because she is unavailable due to pregnancy is sex discrimination. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
Status; the Supreme Court established that tribunals must look at the 'reality of the situation' and disregard sham contract clauses. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
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References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Employment status; dancer; economic reality. A lap dancer was not an employee: clients paid her directly, she paid the club for the right to perform, and she bore the economic risk of a poor night. The payment structure negated the wage-work bargain necessary for a contract of service. Leading authority on economic reality defeating employee status in the adult entertainment sector. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
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References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Limb (b) worker status; LLP member; whistleblowing. A solicitor member of an LLP was a limb (b) worker under s.230(3)(b) ERA 1996 and could bring a protected disclosure detriment claim. The Supreme Court held there is no freestanding subordination requirement for limb (b) status: the statutory question is whether the individual undertakes to perform work personally for a party who is not their client or customer.
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References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Employment status; worker; personal service; substitution. The Supreme Court held that a plumber engaged under a contract describing him as an independent contractor was a limb (b) worker. The dominant feature of the contract was an obligation of personal performance: a right to substitute only another Pimlico operative was too limited to negate it. Pimlico was not a client or customer of a business carried on by him, given the degree of control it exercised and the contractual restrictions on how he worked. The holiday-pay sequel is Smith v Pimlico Plumbers Ltd (No 2) [2022] EWCA Civ 70, entered separately. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
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Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Status; worker; drivers were workers while the app was on, due to control and subordination. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
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Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Limb (b) worker status; associate dentist; personal service; substitution. The tribunal erred in finding an associate dentist was not a worker: a heavily fettered substitution clause, permitting substitution only from a pre-approved pool in limited circumstances, did not negate personal service. The starting point is the purposive statutory test, not shorthand glosses or the labels the contract adopts.
Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Worker Status; substitution clause; a genuine right of unfettered substitution defeats worker status. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Employment status; shareholder-directors of a family farming company found not to be employees or workers. The ET applied the PMOL framework and concluded: no control exercised by the respondent over claimants' work; substitution was possible and occurred in practice; payments were more closely aligned with directors' drawings than employment earnings; no intention to create an employment relationship. The absence of an obligation of personal service was fatal to the limb (b) worker claim. EAT refused appeal at sift, no arguable error of law. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
Status (Dutch law); classification of an arbeidsovereenkomst (art 7:610 BW) depends on all circumstances of the case viewed in connection; nine circumstances listed, including embedding of the work in the organisation and whether the worker behaves or can behave as an entrepreneur in economic life. Deliveroo riders were employees. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
Employment status; mutuality of obligation; control; part-time football referees. Mutuality of obligation and control are necessary but not sufficient conditions of a contract of employment: mutuality can be satisfied within each individual engagement however short, and control requires only a framework of contractual control rather than day-to-day supervision. Short, discrete engagements are capable of being contracts of employment. [Summary not yet checked against the judgment.]
Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.
Employment status; unfair prejudice; quasi-partnership. HHJ Matthews found that shareholder-directors of a family farming company were employees, despite the ET having found the opposite on largely the same facts. The High Court applied the rule in Hollington v Hewthorn (recently reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in Evans v Barclays Bank plc [2025] UKSC 48) to hold the ET's findings inadmissible, and reached its own conclusion based on documentary evidence including accounts, P60s, bank records, and termination letters. Weekly payments held to be wages, not directors' drawings.
Cites
References found in the judgments’ text, with the number of paragraphs in which each case is mentioned. Not a classification: how a case was treated is recorded under Later history.