Cases before Employment Tribunal Increase Manifold
Friday, July 31st, 2009Commenting on the latest report published by Acas – the employment relations service, Ed Sweeney, Acas Chair said that the data in the report is a reflection of the stress the employees as well as businesses had to undergo in the last one year. The report highlighted increasing levels of stress in workplaces as a consequence of the economic downturn. To help organisations reduce stress levels at their offices by ascertaining certain managerial behaviour, and for anyone involved in human resources management, training and development, CIPD training courses can be a valuable source of information.
The data put forth by the report suggests that there was a significant increase of 22% in cases on unfair dismissal, along with increase in other matters before the agency. This was accompanied by a steep increase in calls to the Acas helpline with respect to redundancies. The number of calls had increased by 100% from the previous level of 10,000 to 15,000 calls a week. The increase in number of calls caused Acas to keep the lines open into the evenings as well as on Saturdays to match the demand.
The yearly report of the agency, which is meant to give an overview of the employment scenario in the UK, shows that the number of conciliation cases from the Employment Tribunal Service to Acas increased by 18% to a net of 78,000 cases this year. There was also a substantial increase in conciliation cases for unfair dismissal, which had been on a decline in previous years. The number of such cases rose by 12,000, which was more than a 20% increase.