Zero Hours Con.

The commercial world was rocked yesterday be the High Court’s judgement in the case of Cyril Squirrel v McDonlidons. Judge Harley Higson found Mr Squirrel’s zero hours contract, and by inference all zero hours contracts, to be illegal. He stated that, “In English law a contract must not disadvantage one party in favour of the other. A zero hours contract puts an obligation on Mr Squirrel to be available for work during periods defined by McDonlidons. At McDonlidons discretion Mr Squirrel may not be required and would not be paid. During these periods of unpaid availability there is clearly commercial value conferred on McDonlidons but with no recompense to Mr Squirrel, and further this imbalance is not compensated for during Mr Squirrel’s paid employment. As such we deem the part of the contract requiring Mr Squirrel’s unpaid availability to be illegal. We find that as this illegal contract has been in operation for some time McDonlidon will be required to pay Me Squirrel the sum of £2,500 as fair recompense for his unpaid availability.” The judgement will send shock waves through the many employers using this type of contract. Len McLusty from Unite was “over the moon” saying, ”Finally the courts have found what we knew all along.” Even a spokesman for the CBI said zero hours contracts had been undermining the cooperative relationship between employer and employee and said, “ Now our members won’t be forced to use them in order to be competitive.” After the trial Mr Squirrel said he was thankful that the payout could be used to pay his rent arrears and buy a winter coat.