Nicholas Dobson examines an eternal well-spring of legal surprises
In Ward Hadaway v Capsticks and others (UKEAT/0471/09/SM) the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) had to grapple with the thorny issue of whether TUPE applied when a panel law firm lost a tender to provide legal services to a client body. Judgment was given on 25 March 2010. But first a look at the prequel.
Primeval TUPE
Before the fall, ie before old TUPE was taken in for reconstruction resulting in the sleek, new TUPE offered since 6 April 2006 by the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (SI 2006/246) there was endless dispute, litigation and uncertainty about whether in various different circumstances the old 1981 TUPE Regulations would apply to protect the employment of those employees affected when a public authority or other organisation contracted out functions that had previously been conducted in-house. For if TUPE did apply to a transfer of an undertaking all the rights, powers, duties and liabilities of the originating transferor organisation arising under the contracts of employment of the staff affected would transfer to the transferee
