This week's edition of Employment weekly highlights includes: (1) Employment Rights Bill (ERB) factsheets, (2) a Work Rights Centre (WoRC) briefing examining the impact the ERB will have on vulnerable workers, (3) four government consultations as part of its Plan to Make Work Pay on the application of zero-hours contract measures for agency workers, Statutory Sick Pay, the modernisation of trade union laws, and collective redundancy and fire and rehire, (4) a Welsh government consultation on the Agricultural Wages Order 2025, (5) an Order setting school teachers’ pay and conditions from 1 September 2024, (6) a number of Private Members’ Bills which have received their first reading in the House of Commons, (7) the removal of reference to statutory neonatal care pay and leave from HMRC’s October 2024 Employer Bulletin, (8) an EAT judgment concerning whistleblowing protections for charity trustees, (9) a proposed new whistleblowing Bill, (10) a draft Order which will add to Schedule A2 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (TULR(C)A 1992) the protective award for non-compliance with collective consultation requirements, (11) a Court of Appeal judgment upholding an EAT decision that Ofsted had unfairly dismissed an Ofsted inspector, (12) an employment tribunal ruling that a continuation of contract order can be made even if the employer has lost their sponsorship licence, (13) a new Practice Direction and Presidential Guidance on panel composition in the employment tribunal and EAT, (14) the Employment Appeal Tribunal (Amendment) Rules 2024, (15) a new EAT Practice Direction governing appeals to the EAT from 1 February 2025, (16) our new Employment Rights Bill—tracker, (17) dates for your diary, and (18) updates to our case, consultation and legislation trackers and horizon scanner.

Precisely, when the obligation to pay a debt arises will be determined by the terms of the agreement. Close attention should be paid to the provisions governing payment in order to ascertain when payment falls due. An obligation to pay a sum due under a contract is discharged when payment is made in accordance with the terms of the agreement. For guidance on interpreting contracts, see: Contract interpretation—overview. Matters which may be specifically addressed in the contract include: • the time for payment, which could be a specific date or a period of time referable to an agreed starting date • the place for payment—a specific bank or even bank account might

In respect of relations between agents and third parties generally, in the absence of other indications, when an agent makes a contract, purporting to act solely on behalf of a disclosed principal, whether identified or unidentified, he is not liable to the third party on it. Nor can he sue the third party on it. See Practice Note: Agent and third party relationships. However, at common law, where a person purports to contract on behalf of a principal, and the principal is a fictitious or non-existent person or entity, the person so purporting to contract may sometimes be regarded as having contracted

Arbitration analysis: Can a thumbs up emoji in a text message constitute acceptance of a binding legal agreement? In a case that is sure to be an instant classic among contract law professors, the Court of King’s Bench for Saskatchewan has held that it can. The Court considered the wider factual matrix of the parties’ dealings, and held that a valid contract was created when the plaintiff sent a picture of a paper contract, and the defendant responded with a thumbs up emoji. Each case will turn on its own facts, but parties seeking to enforce an agreement made by way of text messages (which may include, as here, non-text elements) now have some clear guidance from a court of superior jurisdiction. Parties should be mindful of the basic tenets of contract formation and should not presume that an agreement made in an ‘untraditional’ medium will be unenforceable. Written by Kyle R McMillan, associate at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, Calgary.

The Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 (LTA 1987) provides certain qualifying tenants of properties with a right of first refusal. This means that if their landlord is seeking to dispose of its interest in the property (whether

Ofcom has announced new consumer protection rules to ensure customers must be told upfront in pounds and pence about any price rises their provider includes in their contract. This bans mid-contract price rises linked to inflation, and follows the December 2023 general conditions. Guidance to accompany the new rules and assist providers to comply, including examples of how providers could present any in-contract price rises at the point of sale, has also been published. It will be necessary for providers to draw information about in-contract price rises, and when the changes may occur, information to the customer’s attention prominently before they are bound by the contract, in a clear and coherent manner to help them make an informed choice. Providers can increase their prices during the contract period and the new rules do not restrict their ability to set the level of their prices. However, they will prohibit providers from including inflation-linked, or percentage-based, price rise terms that apply to the Core Subscription Price in new contracts. The new rules and guidance will apply to new contracts from 17 January 2025.

This Q&A assumes that the causes of action relied upon by the putative claimant are for breach of contract and in tort. Causation in claims for breach of contract The fundamental principle that underpins a claim for damages for a breach of contract is that there must be a sufficient causal link between the breach of contract and the loss suffered, that loss should not be too remote, and the claimant should not unreasonably incur losses arising from the relevant breach (often referred to as the ‘duty to mitigate’). For a fuller examination of these principles, see generally the Practice Note: Causation and remoteness in contractual breach claims. On the issue of causation specifically,

We have assumed that these are business-to-business standard terms and conditions. There is a general principle of freedom to contract. Unlike consumers, a business customer is not given statutory protection against the imposition of a term allowing unilateral variation of the contract. However, section 3 of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 (UCTA 1977) applies to a business-to-business transaction when one party deals on the other’s written standard terms of business (default terms used as the basis of the majority of the party’s business contracts). Under this provision, the supplier cannot use the variation ‘to render a contractual performance substantially different from that required of them’, unless the contract term satisfies the requirement of reasonableness. The requirement of reasonableness is that it

Commercial analysis: The court considered whether a contract had been formed between the parties in relation to a contractual joint venture. Sundorne Products, trading as Potters Waste Management (Potters) and Geminor signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with respect to jointly bidding for a waste disposal contract with the Isle of Anglesey County Council (the Council). Though there had been an intention to sign a formalised consortium agreement after the MoU, there was a dispute about the consortium agreement’s terms and ultimately it was never agreed. Despite this, the parties continued to do business and to process and transport waste bales. After several months, however, a dispute arose and Potters brought a claim for breach of contract. Geminor argued that in the absence of the consortium agreement, there was never more than an ad hoc agreement between the parties, or in the alternative that breaches by Potters had entitled it to terminate the contract. The court found for Potters. His Honour Judge Hodge KC determined that there had been a contract, and that any breaches by Potters had not been serious enough to permit Geminor to terminate it. Written by Thomas Mallon, barrister at Henderson Chambers.

The Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 (HGCRA 1996) only applies to a ‘construction contract’, namely a contract that satisfies all of the requirements set out in HGCRA 1996, ss 104 to 106 (and, for contracts concluded prior to 1 October 2011, HGCRA 1996, s 107). A construction contract is an agreement to carry out ‘construction operations’ or arrange/supply labour for such operations (HGCRA 1996, s 104). The activities which constitute construction operations for the purposes of the act are set out in HGCRA 1996, s 105(1), albeit subject to HGCRA 1996, s 105(2) which lists excluded works that do not amount to construction operations. Where a contract involves both construction operations and non-construction operations (sometimes referred to as a hybrid contract) the HGCRA 1996 will still apply but only to those parts of the contract which are concerned with construction operations. Construction operations If the works in question do not fall within the list in HGCRA 1996, s 105(1), they are not construction operations under

STOP PRESS: The Contract (Formation and Remedies) (Scotland) Act 2026 (C(FR)(S)A 2026) received Royal Assent on 14 April 2026. It makes provision in relation to the formation of contracts and certain remedies for breach of contract in Scotland, including rules on offer and acceptance, notification, contractual retention, mutuality, rescission for breach and contributory negligence in breach of contract claims. At present, only C(FR)(S)A 2026, ss 15, 27, 28, 29 and 30 are in force. These cover interpretation of Part 1, the general saving provision, ancillary provision, commencement and the short title. The substantive provisions on contract formation and remedies for breach are not yet in force and will come into force on such day or days as the Scottish Ministers appoint by regulations. Missives The most common form of contract in Scottish property transactions is missives of sale, see for example, the Property Standardisation (PSG) PSG—Offers. The contract is formed by parties (or more commonly their agents) exchanging letters of offer and acceptance which together form the missives. Typically,

This guide provides general information about wrongful dismissal claims, whether a claim should be brought in the employment tribunal or in the civil courts, and compensation for wrongful dismissal. Your employment lawyer will be able to provide specific advice based on your circumstances. What is wrongful dismissal? If an employer dismisses an employee without complying with the terms of the contract of employment setting out how the contract can be terminated, the dismissal will be a breach of contract. This is also referred to as a wrongful dismissal. A contract of employment will usually provide that it can be ended by either party giving a specified period of notice in writing. Wrongful dismissal therefore occurs most commonly where an employer dismisses an employee without giving any notice of termination at all (also known as summary dismissal) or with insufficient notice. It can also occur where a fixed-term contract is terminated before its expiry (where the contract does not provide for this), or if there is a contractual disciplinary procedure and the employer does not comply with it before