anyone know anything about employment law?

[jennywren]

dont know if this is the right place to put this but.......

Does anyone know any thing about employment laws, especially for men with children? My OH works full time as do I, however he works 9-5 but I work shifts, so basically when im on nights he is the 'main carer' and when Im on days as its 7-7 he takes DS to Childminder (nannas) and picks him up (otherwise he would be their 6am till 8am if I took him ). Anyway so OHs job when he originally took it says inthe contract he is between 3 sights, one local, Derry & Glasgow and he 'may' have to go to 1 other sight for 1 week out of a month. In 2 years he has only been away about 4 times, ranging from 2 days to the full week but they always give him like 2 days notice & make him go on the Sunday afternoon so he is their ready for Monday morning. when we had oran he said he needed more notice, twices since ive been back at work they have given him 3 days notice and I have had to take emergancy holidays, now they are doing it again, telling him he might have to go to Glasgow on Monday, but ''you might not we dont know yet'' he told them he needs to know by today due to child care issues and they basicallys said we will tell you when we know and you will go. My issue is he is a 50% carer for Oran as he has him when im on nights and does all the childmider trips as its not possible for me, now I know as a working mother I would have rights to say ''no I have a child you must give me more than 3 working days notice'' type thing, but does he?? He says he doesnt as he is ''only the father in their eyes'' and their is nothing he can do but is this really the case?

(ill post this in dads to be bit as well just incase any of the fellas know anything!!)

 

[EllieL]

Hiya,

I work in HR so know a bit about employment law.

The tricky bit with this is that although is specifies in his contact that he may have to work on the other sites, from what you've said it doesn't specify what notice they will give him of this. This means that under the law, they would be expected to give him 'reasonable' notice. However, what would be reasonable varies from person to person, and obviously now that you are parents 2/3 days is not reasonable for you.

With regards to rights as a working parent, he has the same as you. The laws regarding the right to request flexible working and take parental leave applies to any parent, male or female, with a child under 5. This means you both have a right to request flexible working eg changes to start/finish times, part time hours etc. However, if the your employer has a valid, work related reason why this is not possible, they can refuse any such requests.

I'm not sure whether a request for a specific amount of notice for being asked to work on a different site would count as a request for flexible working, but if your OH has already asked informally for more notice, you could try writing formally to his employer (letter to his line manager copied to HR) requesting the amount of notice you require and the reasons for this. I'm assuming that your employer officially require notice for you to book holiday, therefore if you need to give them say a week's notice, you could request for your OH's employer to give hm the same.

If he has made a formal enquiry to his employer he should receive a formal response back. Ideally this would be a letter agreeding to the amont of notice he has requested. Then you have it in writing to hold them to in the future. Alternatively, if they say no, they should give you their reasons. You can then decide what to do - if they are valid work related reasons why it is not possible to give him more notice you may just have to put up with the situation. If you are sure that it would be possible to give him more notice, or indeed send someone else instead of him. you could look at putting in a greivance throught his company's formal procedure. You could look at alternatives - if they have to send him at short notice, could they pay for additional child-minding? Or could he put in a request for flexible working where he is not required to work on other sites?

Anyway, Good luck and hope this helps.

 

[jennywren]

cheers hun that really IS a great help

They ended up saying he didnt need to go anyway but its not the point really!!