Can they complain to their employment agency?
It would be necessary to look at what their contract with the agency actually said, and in particular whether they are stated to be employees of the agency. In the current economic climate, it is unlikely that their agency would be able to find alternative work. If they are employees, they would have the right to a redundancy payment – subject to having two or more years’ continuous employment – and to claim unfair dismissal if the agency had not followed a fair redundancy procedure. In view of the numbers of agency personnel being dismissed, this may mean the agency is obliged to consult formally with employee representatives. However, it is possible that the workers may in fact be described as be self-employed. Whilst this may not reflect the reality of their working relationship, it would still be a big hurdle to showing they were really employees of the agency. And they would have to show that they were its employees, before being able to pursue any claims for unfair dismissal and
