Is this officially 'discrimination'?

[serenity]

and if so, can anyone point me in the direction of something quotable to put in a letter to HR/Boss/Big Boss?

We've just been informed that our company has introduced restrictions in the times that people can take their annual leave. As I'm in retail there's always been certain restrictions due to business need (not meant to take time off at Christmas for example, although it still happens) These new rules mean that, with the exception of the first three weeks of the summer holidays, no co-worker can take AL during any school holidays........you can see how this might cause a few problems

Now, I'm actually OK this year as I've already booked most of my AL (spring and summer half term - both now black listed) but next year I'm going to be stuffed, as are a lot of the people I work with - only parents and students are daft enough to work the hours I do I'm really angry that a company that thinks it's so family friendly can do such an unfriendly thing, I don't want to necessarily wait until it affects me personaly before challenging this, so I want to put something in writing to HR, but I'm unsure whether this is just a generally crappy thing to do or whether it's legally unsound too. Is there any legislation that prevents discrimination against parents?

Any help/advice would be appreciated

Apologies if I don't get back to this thread straight away, but I'm currently PC less and can't get online that often.

TIA

serenity there isn't any legislation preventing discrimination against parents. You are possibly thinking of indirect sex discrimination, where a provision or practice is put into place which puts women at a particular disadvantage when compared to men and can't be justified as what's called a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. Things around flexible working arrangements or restrictions are often considered under this legislation on the grounds that women tend to provide more of the childcare than men. To bring a successful case, you would have to demonstrate 4 things -

1 the fact that there is a provision in place.
2 the fact that the provision causes detriment to a considerably larger proportion of women than men
3 the fact that the person bringing the claim has suffered a detriment and
4 the fact that the employer can't justify the provision as a legitimate business decision.

I'm not convinced you'd have a claim tbh, as all parents would be affected I'd say, not particularly women in this case, it's not about flexible working, it's about taking holiday. Plus there is the issue of can it be justified for legitimate business reasons - possibly it could, I don't know. It doesn't stop you writing to the appropriate person in any case of course.

To change your terms and conditions the workforce must be consulted - has this happened? I would expect in retail unions to be involved and to have raised all these issues, is that not the case? With something like this obviously people protesting in numbers is more likely to have an effect.

I agree with everything Flowery said.

As I mentioned on another thread, the remedy for a forced change in terms and conditions is to claim constructive dismissal (i.e. to claim that the treatment is so bad that it has breached the contract and you can walk out). Compensation is available for loss of earnings on constructive dismissal but it is a very hard case to bring and it means being out of a job. I am not sure that you would win a case in this situation. It would be risky.

I agree with Flowery on the discrimination issue.

Isn't the most likely thing just that they lose loads of good staff? Maybe the solution given their attitude is just to dust off the old cv...

Thanks for the comments

I don't think they'd need to change the T&Cs tbh. I'm pretty sure that there is a general caveat that says holidays etc are granted based on business need, and their reason for implementing this is because it does get busier during the holidays (although imo not enough to justify this rather draconian and very short sighted rule!)

I guessed sex discrimination wouldn't cover this, as you said it affects fathers too, plus it'll affect students, and we have a fair few of those too.

Oh well. There as been a bit of an uproar about this and I'm hoping that the PTB will see sense of their own accord, I just hoped that there would be something more official on our side. If it stays in place I'll definitely be leaving come September when DD is in full time school, and pretty much all of the people I've spoken too have said something similar. It's a shame though, generally it's a pretty good place to work - I just can't see anyway to work around this. It's not much good for motivation either, we had a massive drop in sales etc last year when loads of people were made redundant because everyone was so p'd off with the way it was done. The atmosphere atm feels exactly the same - no one wants to put themselves out because they feel illused.

I solve this problem by just not working (I work at home though, am going into the building novelty wooden bird boxes business if anyone's interested.), ds has 8 week holiday for the summer, 4 weeks for easter, 4 weeks for christmas and half terms that are sometimes different to those in state schools. In the past I have had to pass the poor soul around family and friends. The I hired a nanny, I paid her more than I earned. There's no holiday clubs running until all of the state schools close 2 weeks after ds has broken up.

Serenity, I don't think this is discrimination as it does not discriminate against one group of people more than another. You could claim however, that as more women work in your store (??) and women are mainly the carers for children that this could be classed as discrimination (?). The equal opportunities commission (i don't know their number but they have a web site) have a helpline and they may be able to give you some advice. I used to work in retail to fund my law degree. I didn't have to work weekends as they employed 6th formers who were only too glad for the money. I would start to look for an employer that is more family friendly, or , as I have done, set up your own company so that you can choose your hours and have the school holidays to care for your children. You can also get working tax credit. Good luck.

I hadn't thought of the childcare issue actually - I don't work fulltime and I don't work during the day so it's never been something I have to think about (Dcs are at home in bed with Dh when I'm at work) Hopefully that'll be more rebellious workers then to persuade them that this just isn't a good idea. I'll have to go in during the day and do a bit of stirring

An after thought, how are you and your family going to be able to go on a holiday together? If we're not supposto take them outside the school holidays and you won't be able to take the school holidays off work then that's unfair. Your family will have to go without you and you'll have to go by yourself because they'll be at school. I don't think it's right that an employer is able to dictate to you when you can and can not go on holiday. I understand about christmas being very busy but how can they justify the school holidays?

avenanap you may not think it's right that an employer can dictate when holiday is to be taken but the unfortunate fact is that as long as each employee gets the holiday they are entitled to, an employer can state exactly when it's to be taken.

The only issue here is whether a change to the stated terms and conditions of the contract has been made or is proposed.

Ohh, that's mean.

Of course the upside is that most employers do try and accommodate employees' requests if at all possible, so it's not all doom and gloom

So, parents will have greater difficulty in organising childcare during holidays, but also will only be able to take family holidays during term-time. So how's that going to square with all the schools that are now refusing to authorise term-time absence?

It's not. Essentially all the parents with school age children will have to go away during the last week of July/first two weeks of August which just won't work - too many people, not enough time. My school is cracking down on term time absences (not that I take them out anyway), I don't think they'd be that happy with it tbh. I've never worked anywhere where you can just take whatever holiday you want, when you want. There's always some degree of compromise, everyone can't all go at the same time, but at the same time I've never had an employer be so unfair as to just blanket ban huge swathes of time either.

Actually writing this down has helped....I'm coming out of 'righteously pissed off' into 'well sod them'. Won't do much for my motivation and output but reduces the chance of me developing a stress ulcer.

If it doesn't change, I'm gone. Their loss frankly.

absolutely serenity, I think people voting with their feet is the only answer here really.