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Arbitration of employment disputes.
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Weber, Richard D. |
| Copyright Year | 2000 |
| Abstract | The increasing popularity of arbitration Resolving employment disputes has traditionally been the domain of employment tribunals and the High Court (or county court), despite complaints about both systems. Criticisms about tribunals, rightly or wrongly, centre on lack of rigour in case management, delay in the listing of hearings and the delivery of judgments, and the general inability of a successful party to recover its legal costs. Cuts in funding – despite the introduction of fees – are only likely to make matters worse. As for the High Court, concerns are being expressed about the rigidity and intrusiveness of some of the key Jackson reforms, in particular arbitrary cost limits on the conduct of litigation and the zero tolerance ’Mitchell’ regime, which can see relatively minor breaches in procedural timetables leading to draconian penalties. Traditionally, arbitration has not been widely used in the UK to resolve employment disputes, unlike in the US. There is a perception that arbitration clauses are ineffective due to the inability of employees to contract out of their statutory employment rights. However, as we note below, this is by no means an insuperable obstacle. In any event, it does not explain the infrequent use of arbitration to resolve common law employment claims; the principal reason for this, we would suggest, is a simple lack of familiarity with the process. Arbitration clauses are in our experience only rarely found in employment agreements governed by English law, despite becoming standard in the partnership and LLP agreements governing many of the UK’s law firms. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the past reluctance to arbitrate employment disputes is now on the wane. Whereas arbitration of employment disputes was virtually unheard of five years ago, we are aware of more and more arbitrations taking place. This may also be influenced by the increasing global nature of business and the prevalence of arbitration as a means of resolving employment disputes outside Europe, particularly in the US. Some suggest the extra cost of arbitrator fees makes arbitration appropriate only for high value claims; however, the same applies to mediation and, like mediation, employers can agree to pay all or most of such fees (although note that s.60 of the Arbitration Act provides that an agreement for an employer to pay all the arbitration costs is only valid if it is made after the dispute has arisen). Once the benefits are more widely realised by practitioners, arbitration will only become more common. However, the arguments are not all one way, and employment lawyers advising on the possible use of arbitration need to be aware of its main advantages and disadvantages. |
| Starting Page | 18 |
| Ending Page | 18 |
| Page Count | 1 |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| PubMed reference number | 14625952 |
| Journal | Medline |
| Volume Number | 82 |
| Issue Number | 8 |
| Journal | The Journal of the Michigan Dental Association |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://www.blackstonechambers.com/documents/179/Arbitration_of_employment_disputes.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
