12. Disciplinary, Dismissal, and Grievance Procedures

During the performance of the employment contract the employer may find it necessary to exercise some form of disciplinary authority over the employee, which may take one of a number of forms, ranging from informal warnings, etc, through to final warning or dismissal. There will also be occasions when the employee will wish to pursue a grievance over the way he is treated, and a suitable grievance procedure is the obvious channel to be used. This chapter discusses disciplinary procedures and grievance procedures, how to draw up such procedures and the conduct of disciplinary hearings; the right to be accompanied; disciplinary rules; and the exercise of disciplinary powers such as suspension, warnings and other sanctions.

3. The Formation of a Contract of Employment

This chapter discusses how an employment contract is formed, and it then looks at the terms and conditions of employment and how these terms are to be interpreted. The types of terms discussed include express terms, implied terms, statutory terms, collective agreements and how such collective terms are incorporated, and looks at custom as a source of employment terms and works and staff rules. The chapter also considers other aspects of the contract of employment such as disciplinary and grievance procedures, job descriptions, written particulars of the contract of employment, the right to itemised pay statements, variation of contractual terms, and occupational pension schemes.

Internal States in the UK

This chapter discusses internal states in the United Kingdom, focusing on PartnershipCo. It investigates the workplace institutions at PartnershipCo that act to repress and transform conflict. A number of internal institutions limit the ability of managers to secure control via traditional forms of despotism in important ways. In particular, the labor union policed disciplinary and grievance procedures, rationalized discipline, and provided workers with employment protection. The chapter then highlights how the union at PartnershipCo operated as an ideological element of the internal state that had a normative (if unreliable) control function. The presence of collective bargaining and significant union presence at PartnershipCo raise the question of whether the internal state was hegemonic.

The Demand for Individual Grievance Procedures in Germany and Spain: Labour Law Changes versus Business Cycle

In this article, we analyze the determinants of annual number of grievance procedures, mainly individual complaints against unfair dismissals. Econometric analyses using two balanced panels from the 11 West German states (1964- 2006) and the 17 autonomous regions of Spain (1987-2006) show that labour market characteristics, such as the unemployment and the vacancy rate have a much stronger influence on the cyclical demand for individual grievance procedures than changes in “workers’ rights”. Thus, the individual costs of unemployment are better predictors of the demand for individual grievance procedures than institutional changes strengthening or weakening employees’ rights.