Update on employee shareholder status

Back in February I co-wrote a short article with Robyn Armes about the proposed new employee shareholder status.

The Bill implementing the changes has now, after several amendments, been passed by Parliament and the new status is set to be introduced on 1st September 2013. Prior to the Bill being passed the House of Lords required numerous changes to the scheme, including:

• a person will not lose Jobseekers’ Allowance if they refuse an offer of employment in an employee shareholder role;
• an employer offering employee shareholder status must provide the potential employee with a statement explaining the employment rights that they will lose, and the rights attaching to the shares;
• a person must receive independent legal advice about the offer of employee shareholder status before accepting an offer of employment on that basis, in much the same way that employees must receive independent advice on a compromise agreement. The employer will be required to pay for the advice, even if the offer is rejected; and
• an employee who accepts an offer of employee shareholder status will be entitled to change their mind for up to 7 days after the date upon which they received legal advice.

Employers should now give thought to whether employing staff on an employee shareholder basis will work for them.

If you need any further advice about this subject, please contact Andrew Cooper on 01284 717511 or  andrewcooper@greene-greene.com.

Loss of State Pension Entitlement on Divorce

Until now you could elect to substitute your spouse’s National Insurance contribution for your own on divorce if this would give you a higher basic State Pension.

This meant, on retirement you would both receive the same amount of State Pension.

Now the Government is likely to withdraw this potentially significant benefit retrospectively for all people who reach State Pension age after 5^th April 2016, whenever you got divorced.  You should bear this in mind as it could be an important factor to be considered in resolving a financial settlement upon divorce.

If you will reach Pension age between now and 5^th April 2016 and you think it is possible that such an election to substitute would be to your benefit, then you should consider making that election now.

Kate Chandler, Stuart Hughes or Juliet Harvey in our Family Team can provide you with further advice if you need.

Kate Chandler - 01284 717513 | Stuart Hughes - 01284 717493 | Juliet Harvey - 01284 717448

Stella English, winner of The Apprentice, loses claim against Lord Sugar’s company

Stella English, who won series six of ‘The Apprentice’ has lost her claim of constructive dismissal against Lord Sugar’s company Amshold Group Ltd.

The Employment Tribunal panel unanimously found against Ms English and Employment Judge Warren handed down a damning judgment which questioned her credibility as a witness and stated that she was “ill advised” to bring such a claim.

Despite accepting three separate contracts of employment during the time she was employed by Lord Sugar, Ms English claimed that throughout her employment she had been persistently subjected to treatment which was so serious that her trust and confidence in her employer had been irrevocably destroyed. As a result, Ms English claimed that she had no option but to resign from her £100,000 per annum position, describing herself as an ‘overpaid lackey’. This is despite accepting under Oath that she enjoyed her work, which she felt was meaningful.

She also alleged that the fact that she only met Lord Sugar 5 times after winning ‘The Apprentice’ was a further breach of her trust and confidence, despite being warned on several occasions before, during and after the filming of the show that the winner would report to someone other than him on a day-to-day basis and was highly unlikely to see Lord Sugar himself regularly.

The tribunal found unanimously that there was no dismissal – Ms English resigned and, therefore her complaint of unfair constructive dismissal was dismissed. In his closing comments Employment Judge Warren stated that “this was a claim which should never have been brought”.

Lord Sugar is reported to have commented that  "The allegations were without substance, and I believe this case was brought with one intention in mind - the presumption that I would not attend the tribunal, that I would not testify and that I would settle out-of-court, sending Ms English on her way with a tidy settlement………I'm afraid she underestimated me and her reputation is now in tatters. I have principles and I am not going to be forced to compromise them, no matter how much time and money they might cost me."

The contents of this article are for general information only. If you would like to know more about constructive unfair dismissal, feel free to contact Robyn Armes in our employment team on 01284 717446 or email robynarmes@greene-greene.com

Problems with Wills

I was giving a talk the other day to a local Womens’ Institute and was surprised at the number of people who came up to me afterwards to talk about the problems with Wills their family had faced after the death of a relative.  Most had not appreciated that they may have been able to have done something to resolve the problem.

The facts of the recent Court of Appeal case of Hawes v Burgess are not, I suspect, that uncommon.  A widow makes a Will leaving her estate equally between her 3 children.  Two of the children fall out.  One of those then arranges for their mother, who is elderly and in failing health to make a new Will, all but cutting out their brother.  The mother was seen by a solicitor when making the Will, who thought she was entirely “compos mentis”.  However, she was accompanied by her daughter who was the “driving force” behind the new instructions.  Their mother had not fallen out with her son and did not tell him about the changes to the Will.

The Court found that the last Will was invalid so the estate was distributed under the terms of the earlier Will equally between the 3 children.  The daughter, who was instrumental in the instructions for the invalid Will, was ordered to pay the costs.

As a member of ACTAPS – the Association of Contentious Trusts Probate Specialists, for over 14 years I have considerable experience in advising families and individuals in respect of problematic Wills and can often give a preliminary view over the telephone as to whether your problem is worth investigating further.

For further information contact Kate Chandler on 01284 717513 or email k.chandler@greene-greene.com

Beat the increase in small claims limit

In February 2013, the Government decided to increase the general small claims limit. The necessary amendment rules were published earlier this month and provide that with effect from 1 April 2013 the upper financial limit for a small claim would be raised from £5,000 to £10,000.

Currently cases between £5,000 and £10,000 are generally dealt with under fast track provisions in which costs awarded to the winner are payable by the loser. As no costs (save for very limited costs of issue) are recoverable in the small claims track, if you have a claim worth between £5,000 and £10,000 and wish to benefit from the current costs rules you will need to ensure proceedings are issued before the changes on 1 April. Given the need to comply with pre-action protocols and in particular to send a letter before action it would be necessary to act now.

As of late February it is not known what changes the Court Service intend to make towards a) Court fees and b) the amount of costs to be allowed on judgment. These may well be revised to take into account the changes coming into effect on 1 April.

For further information contact Juliet Harvey on 01284 717448 or email julietharvey@greene-greene.com

Doing Business in Suffolk

When I first came to work in Bury St Edmunds my friends thought I was mad. It was the late 1980s, a time of boom and bust, when you could make as much on your house increasing in value as you would by going to work. City lawyers were praised and berated in equal measure; you might remember Harry Enfield’s “loadsamoney” or Wall Street’s “lunch is for wimps”. I was right in the thick of it, doing “mergers and acquisitions” (buying and selling big businesses) for a national firm. When I said I was leaving my colleagues told me that Bury was both an irrelevant backwater and a graveyard of ambition.

The reality was very different. Greene & Greene already had a great client base of public and private companies, doing all the same things I had seen before. If anything the clients were more active, more profitable and probably more open minded. But there was an image problem; we dealt with banks and other advisers in London who assumed that Bury St Edmunds was all “farmers and village idiots”. Being from Suffolk we would not know what we were doing when faced with “Real Work”. Those same perceptions also restricted recruitment, an urgent issue since our firm is only ever as good as the lawyers we have available for clients.

We had to clearly communicate what we do as a business. The marketplace was crowded, with every lawyer claiming to be great at everything. Our strategy was to not to make unsubstantiated claims but to gather testimonials and recommendations from real people that we work with; our clients, other advisers and the other parties to the transactions we were doing. With their consent we publicised real deals we had done for them and passed on what they truly thought about us. They never asked for (or received) any kick back or payment.

We have followed that strategy ever since. It works. The volume of work we now do just for business clients is greater than the whole firm did back in the 1980s. Email and Skype has made location less important. Our website, blog and twitter account get our messages out quickly. In the last year we easily recruited seven new lawyers. Clients that visit us here in Bury only have good things to say about the town, only last month a non executive director visiting for a client’s board meeting asked me “how come you get to work here?”

Chris Thomson | christhomson@greene-greene.com | T: 01284 717412

Written at the request of the East Anglian Daily Times as part of a feature on doing business in West Suffolk.  Article Published:  28 February 2013