In a case arising from the sudden collapse of a construction company, the Employment Appeal Tribunal has confirmed the limited scope of the ‘special circumstances’ defence for not consulting on collective redundancies. |
Case Reports |
2022/6 Narrow scope of the ‘special circumstances’ defence for not consulting on collective redundancies confirmed (UK) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Collective Redundancies |
Authors | David Hopper and Kerry Salisbury |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Case Reports |
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Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Collective Agreements |
Authors | David Hopper and Kerry Salisbury |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The Supreme Court has confirmed that recognised trade unions do not have a veto over employers making direct offers to their members to change terms and conditions of employment. Employers must, however, follow and exhaust the collective bargaining processes with their recognised unions before they may make direct offers with a view to resolving an impasse that has arisen. |
Case Reports |
2022/4 Legal requisites for age thresholds in employer-funded pension plans (GE) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Age Discrimination |
Authors | Othmar K. Traber |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The Federal Labour Court of Germany has continued to specify the requirements for the legality of age limits in employer-funded pension plans under German law. In this case, according to the Court, the employer could impose a maximum age of 55 as a requirement of entry to the company pension plan. |
Case Reports |
2022/3 Liability for late implementation of EU law following ruling from the ECJ (DK) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Age Discrimination, Miscellaneous |
Authors | Christian K. Clasen |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The Danish Ministry of Employment has been held liable for a protracted legislative process following the ECJ’s ruling in the Ole Andersen case (C-499/08), which concluded that the Salaried Employees Act was not compliant with Directive 2000/78/EC concerning equal treatment in employment and occupation (prohibition of discrimination on grounds of age). |
Case Reports |
2022/7 Dismissal for violation of Covid-19 quarantine order (AT) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Unfair dismissal |
Authors | Andreas Tinhofer and Isabella Göschl |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The Supreme Court has decided that the summary dismissal of an employee for violating a Covid-19 quarantine order by appearing at work is effective and justified. |
Case Reports |
2022/5 Breach of procedure leads to legal presumption of discrimination against a severely disabled applicant (GE) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Discrimination General, Disability Discrimination |
Authors | Susanne Burkert-Vavilova |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The German Federal Labour Court has held that where a job-filling procedure disregards mandatory procedural and/or promotional obligations in favour of severely disabled persons, this results in the presumption that an unsuccessful severely disabled applicant had not been considered in the procedure and hence had been disadvantaged on account of their severe disability. In the case at hand the severely disabled job applicant was entitled to compensation for non-pecuniary damage. |
Case Reports |
2022/9 The organisation of working time in a company must not infringe employees’ rights to weekly rest (RO) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Working Time |
Authors | Andreea Suciu and Andreea Oprea |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The Iaşi Court of Appeal in Romania has upheld a decision issued by the Vaslui Tribunal which found that an employee cannot be the subject of disciplinary action for the refusal to perform work during their weekly rest notwithstanding that a working time schedule imposed by the employer was based on the applicability of an internal company policy. |
Case Reports |
2022/10 Labour Tribunal of Brussels decides that Deliveroo riders are self-employed workers and not employees (BE) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Employment Status |
Authors | Gautier Busschaert |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Working as a rider for the Deliveroo platform is a professional activity that can be performed as a self-employed worker, the Labour Tribunal of Brussels has decided, which also ruled out the possibility of Deliveroo riders enjoying the fiscally beneficial status available for workers active on electronic platforms of the collaborative economy (or ‘sharing economy’). |
Case Reports |
2022/8 Port Labour Act not in conflict with the Belgian Constitution (BE) |
Journal | European Employment Law Cases, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Free Movement, Work and Residence Permit |
Authors | Heleen Franco and Julien Hick |
AbstractAuthor's information |
In its judgment of 25 November 2021, the Belgian Constitutional Court has upheld the obligation to call on recognised dock workers for the activity consisting of preparing trailers on a dock for shipment with a vehicle specifically intended for that purpose (known as a ‘tugmaster tractor’). The obligation to rely solely on recognised dock workers for the performance of port work is justified, among other things, by the need to improve safety in port areas and to prevent accidents at work. The identical treatment of, on the one hand, the loading and unloading of ships in the strict sense and, on the other hand, the activity of preparing trailers on a dock for shipment with a tugmaster tractor, does not breach the principle of equality and non-discrimination. Therefore, equal treatment of both types of port labour, with regard to the obligation to call on recognised dock workers, is reasonably justified. |
Article |
Fit for Office? The Perception of Female and Male Politicians by Dutch Voters |
Journal | Politics of the Low Countries, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | political underrepresentation, gender stereotypes, role incongruity, candidate evaluation, experimental vignette study |
Authors | Rozemarijn E. van Dijk and Joop van Holsteyn |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The underrepresentation of women in politics is a worldwide phenomenon and the Netherlands fit the pattern: about 39% of the Dutch MPs are female. Based on social role incongruity theory, it is expected that female politicians are evaluated more negatively than male politicians since women do not fit the dominant male politician role. However, most research is conducted in the United States, that is, a candidate-centred system where individual characteristics play an important role. This article focuses on the party-centred parliamentary context in which we examine (1) whether gender stereotypes are present among citizens and (2) to what extent these stereotypes influence the evaluation of politicians. We do this by conducting an experimental vignette survey design. We find that at the mass level there is no difference between the evaluation of male and female politicians, although gender stereotypes are present. |
Article |
Morality in the Populist Radical RightA Computer-Assisted Morality Frame Analysis of a Prototype |
Journal | Politics of the Low Countries, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | Populist radical right, morality, frame analysis, word2vec, crimmigration |
Authors | Job P.H. Vossen |
AbstractAuthor's information |
This article provides a computer-assisted morality framing analysis of Vlaams Belang’s 2019 manifesto. The VB is regarded in the literature as a prototypical example of the Populist Radical Right (PRR). We first concisely review what PRR politics is and what it consists of, tentatively distinguishing four elements that we hypothesise will materialise in corresponding subframes running throughout the manifesto. We point to a mismatch between the omnipresent role of morality in all PRR subframes and the little attention devoted to the concept in the PRR literature. We introduce a useful theory from social psychology into framing literature to create a novel methodological approach to frame analysis that builds a bridge between a qualitative content and a quantitative context approach. The results support our hypothesis that populism, nationalism, nativism and authoritarianism can be distinguished from one another. Additionally, we detect a fifth PRR subframe, crimmigration, by its unique role of morality. |
Article |
Opening an Absolute Majority A Typology of Motivations for Opening and Selecting Coalition Partners |
Journal | Politics of the Low Countries, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | negotiation, absolute majority, oversized coalition, motivations, local election |
Authors | Geoffrey Grandjean and Valentine Meens |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Following the municipal elections in the Walloon Region (Belgium) on 14 October 2018, 189 political groups won an absolute majority. Twenty-two of these decided not to exercise power alone, but favoured the formation of an oversized coalition by integrating a minority partner. The aim of this article is to identify the motivations behind the formation of a local coalition when one of the partners has an absolute majority. Semi-structured interviews with mayors and leaders of political groups in these municipalities make it possible to identify the motivations for, first, the choice to open and, second, the choice of a minority partner. By distinguishing between necessary and supporting motivations, this article shows that the search for greater representation is a necessary motivation for the choice to open, whereas personal affinities and memories of the past are necessary motivations for choosing minority partners. By prioritising motivations, this article shows that. |
Article |
Meetings between victims and offenders suffering from a mental disorder in forensic mental health facilities: a qualitative exploration of their subjective experiences |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue Online First 2022 |
Keywords | Victim-offender meetings, restorative justice, forensic mental health, victimology, perception |
Authors | Mariëtte van Denderen and Michiel van der Wolf |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Most studies about victim-offender meetings have been performed within prison populations, with little reference to offenders diagnosed with mental disorders. In establishing the effects of such meetings, these studies often use quantitative measures. Little is known about meetings between victims and offenders with mental disorders and about the more qualitative subjective experiences of the participants regarding these meetings. In this interview study, we inquired into the subjective experiences of sixteen participants in victim-offender meetings, six of whom are victims and ten offenders of severe crimes, currently residing in forensic mental health facilities. Topics of the interviews included benefits of the meeting and perceptions of each other prior to and after the meeting. Important benefits that participants experienced from meeting each other were reconnecting with family, processing the offence and contributing to each other’s well-being. Such benefits are comparable to those mentioned in studies on meetings with offenders without a mental disorder, challenging the practice that mentally disordered offenders are often excluded from such meetings. Most victims experienced a positive change in perception of the offender owing to the meeting. They perceived the offender as a human being and associated him less exclusively with his offence. Implications for clinical practice are addressed. |
Article |
Restorative justice training for judges and public prosecutors in the European Union: what is on offer and where are the gaps? |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue Online First 2022 |
Keywords | restorative justice, judicial training, judges, public prosecutors |
Authors | Ana Catarina Pereira, Britt De Craen and Ivo Aertsen |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Judges and public prosecutors across Europe continue to be the main source of referral of cases to restorative justice programmes organised in the context of the criminal justice system. As a result, the training of these two groups of legal professionals regarding what restorative justice is and what it can offer to victims, offenders and the community has for many years been identified as a priority for the development of restorative justice in the European Union (EU). However, little information is available about what actually exists in terms of judicial training on restorative justice within the national judicial training institutions responsible for the initial and/or continuous training of judges and/or public prosecutors. Therefore, we developed an online survey on judicial training on restorative justice and invited 38 judicial training institutions operating in the (then) 28 EU Member States to participate in our study. We were able to make relevant observations regarding the reasons for the non-existence of restorative justice training in most of the judicial training institutions studied and identify important elements of the architecture of the restorative justice training offered by the judicial training institution of Czech Republic. |
Article |
Promoting restorative justice as de jure punishment: a vision for a different future |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | restorative justice, punishment |
Authors | Christian Gade |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Restorative justice has frequently been presented as a new criminal justice paradigm, and as something that is radically different from punishment. I will argue that this ‘oppositioning’ is problematic for two reasons: first, because some cases of restorative justice constitute de facto punishment from the perspectives of some positions on what punishment is; second, because restorative justice could reasonably be more widely adopted as a new form of de jure punishment, which could potentially increase the use of restorative justice for the benefit of victims, offenders and society at large. In connection with the latter, I want to present some preliminary thoughts on how restorative justice could be incorporated into future criminal justice systems as de jure punishment. Furthermore, I will suggest that by insisting that restorative justice is radically different from punishment, restorative justice advocates may - contrary to their intentions − play into the hands of those who want to preserve the status quo rather than developing future criminal justice systems in the direction of restorative justice. |
Article |
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Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | public wrongs, R.A. Duff, agent-relative values, criminalisation, punishment |
Authors | Theo van Willigenburg |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Restorative justice has been criticised for not adequately giving serious consideration to the ‘public’ character of crimes. By bringing the ownership of the conflict involved in crime back to the victim and thus ‘privatising’ the conflict, restorative justice would overlook the need for crimes to be treated as public matters that concern all citizens, because crimes violate public values, i.e., values that are the foundation of a political community. Against this I argue that serious wrongs, like murder or rape, are violations of agent-neutral values that are fundamental to our humanity. By criminalising such serious wrongs we show that we take such violations seriously and that we stand in solidarity with victims, not in their capacity as compatriots but as fellow human beings. Such solidarity is better expressed by organising restorative procedures that serve the victim’s interest than by insisting on the kind of public condemnation and penal hardship that retributivists deem necessary ‘because the public has been wronged’. The public nature of crimes depends not on the alleged public character of the violated values but on the fact that crimes are serious wrongs that provoke a (necessarily reticent) response from government officials such as police, judges and official mediators. |
Article |
Is a whole-school approach necessary? The potential for alternative models of restorative justice in education |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | restorative justice, procedural justice, student voice |
Authors | Heather Norris |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Evaluations of restorative justice frequently report that only a minority of schools succeed in adopting a whole-school approach. More common are a consortium of practices necessitating the evaluation of schools not implementing the whole-school model but still achieving positive results. Previous research established that unconventional models have successful outcomes, yet little is known about the contextual factors and the causal mechanisms of different practices. This study finds that models of restorative justice facilitating student voice and consequently procedural justice have promising outcomes. Importantly, alternative models may be less resource-intensive, making them more feasible to fully implement. |
Article |
Appendix Fit for Office? The Perception of Female and Male Politicians by Dutch Voters |
Journal | Politics of the Low Countries, Issue 1 2022 |
Keywords | political underrepresentation, gender stereotypes, role incongruity, candidate evaluation, experimental vignette study |
Authors | Rozemarijn Esmee van Dijk and Joop van Holsteyn |
AbstractAuthor's information |
The underrepresentation of women in politics is a worldwide phenomenon and the Netherlands fit the pattern: about 39% of the Dutch MPs are female. Based on social role incongruity theory, it is expected that female politicians are evaluated more negatively than male politicians since women do not fit the dominant male politician role. However, most research is conducted in the United States, that is, a candidate-centred system where individual characteristics play an important role. This article focuses on the party-centred parliamentary context in which we examine (1) whether gender stereotypes are present among citizens and (2) to what extent these stereotypes influence the evaluation of politicians. We do this by conducting an experimental vignette survey design. We find that at the mass level there is no difference between the evaluation of male and female politicians, although gender stereotypes are present. |
Article |
The case for using culturally relevant values in restorative justice programming for Australian Aboriginal prisoners |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue Online First 2022 |
Keywords | Australia, Aboriginal, prison, values, restorative justice |
Authors | Jane Anderson |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Western Australia is experiencing high rates of recidivism among Aboriginal offenders. This challenge can be partly addressed by delivering culturally relevant programming. Its dearth, however, suggests two questions: what is culturally fit in the context of the prison, and how might such programming be constructed? This article responds to these questions by focusing on one element of culture, ‘values’, that is influential ideas that determine desirable courses of action in a culture. Firstly, a review of the literature and comparative analysis is given to the respective key values of Aboriginal culture and European and Anglo-Australian cultures. It also highlights the importance of repairing Aboriginal values with implications for providing culturally relevant prison programming. Secondly, a report is given on how an in-prison Aboriginal restorative justice programme (AIPRJP) was co-designed by Noongar Elders and prisoners and me, an Anglo-Australian restorativist. Using an ethnographic approach, the project identified a set of Aboriginal values for addressing the harms resulting from historical manifestations of wrongdoing by settler colonialism and contemporary crimes of Aboriginal offenders. Brief commentary is then given to the delivery of the AIPRJP, followed by a summary of findings and recommendations for using culturally relevant programming. |
Article |
Diversion and restorative justice in the context of juvenile justice reforms in Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam |
Journal | The International Journal of Restorative Justice, Issue Online First 2022 |
Keywords | children’s rights, juvenile justice, restorative justice, diversion, implementation challenges, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines |
Authors | Le Thu Dao, Le Huynh Tan Duy, Ukrit Sornprohm e.a. |
AbstractAuthor's information |
Diversion is an important vehicle for delivering an alternative model of youth justice, one that is, hopefully, grounded in principles of children’s rights and restorative justice. Several Asia-Pacific countries, often with international assistance, have sought to develop alternative processes and programmes to which children in conflict with the law can be diverted to. In some instances, these have included restorative justice programmes. This article provides an overview of the implementation of a restorative justice approach, as a youth justice diversion measure, in four South-East Asian countries: Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam. It describes juvenile justice reforms in these countries, particularly as they relate to the implementation of diversion and restorative justice and reflects on the factors that may have affected the success of these reforms. Every one of these countries has achieved a measure of success in implementing diversion and restorative justice, although restorative justice has occupied a different place in these reforms. The article offers a general overview of key challenges and notable successes encountered during that process, as well as an opportunity to consider the role of tradition, culture and public expectations in the implementation of restorative justice principles in the context of juvenile justice. |