Is the Statutory Grievance Procedure Working Effectively?
Last month both ACAS and the Employment Tribunals Service published their annual reports. The ACAS report demonstrated that use of their helpline had increased slightly from 908,553 calls compared to the previous years 880,787 and that the number of visits to the ACAS website had grown considerably. In addition the ETS report indicated that the number of claims had increased by almost 49,000, with much of the increase being seen in the areas of Equal pay and claims under the Working Time Directive. The CBI has expressed understandable concern over these results. The statistics raise questions as to the effectiveness of the Government’s statutory reforms of Grievance and Dismissal /Disciplinary procedures in workplaces under the Employment Act 2002. In particular the statutory grievance procedures require the majority of workplace disputes to be raised internally in the hope that a resolution can be achieved without the dispute having to be referred to an Employment Tribunal. The figure
