This month Ian Smith explains why, whatever diplomatic wrangles lie ahead, our European obligations will continue
- Monitoring employee communications.
- Forcing contractual change by proposing change and letting employees choose.
- Don’t expect to be paid for ‘working time’.
At a time of party conferences when questions arise (if allowed to) as to the speed or otherwise of our departure from the EU, the three cases chosen for this month’s column all show the continuing significance legally of our European obligations, which is likely to continue for some time to come. The first concerns the topical issue of the monitoring of employee electronic communications, with the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in effect reviewing its previous rather indulgent view on the matter. The second concerns linked cases from Poland in which the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) considered the employer tactic of forcing contractual changes by ‘proposing’ changes and leaving it up to the employees to decide whether to accept those changes or not. Both of these show a relatively expansive interpretation of the relevant
