Employment law Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words - 2

troth law - Essay ExampleThe emphasis is on the common law tests customd to determine employee status. This is a particularly contentious area in the modern labour markets where the lines between the employed and self-employed are increasingly blurred.3 This paper demonstrates that the common law tests developed to determine the employee status is unsatisfactory and why. I. importee of Determining Employee Status Initially, the courts treated the employee status as one defined around the concept of win and servant. As a result, during the 19th century, the function relationship was primarily regarded as one of service in which the emphasis was on the servants (employees) duty to remain loyal and subservient rather than the superordinates (employers) duty to provide continuing employment.4 In more juvenile times the enounce worker continues to gain currency in legislation and regulations suggesting the modernisation of employee status.5 For instance, Section 230(3) of the Emp loyment Rights Act 1996 provides that In this Act worker (except in the phrases shop worker and betting worker) means an individual who has entered into or works (or, where the employment has ceased, worked under) (a) A contract of employment, or (b) Any other contract, whether express or implied and (if it is express) whether verbal or in writing, whereby the individual undertakes to do or perform personally any work or services for a nonher party to the contract whose status is not by virtue of the contract that or a client or customer of any profession or business undertaking carried on by the individual.6 In other words, the term worker is used interchangeably with the word employee, reflecting the varying forms of employment that can take place in modern times. For instance the individual who works from home whitethorn not be under the kind of control that the workplace employee is, but should not be denied employee status.7 The use of the word worker immediately draws attent ion to the changing nature of the employee status and carries with it the identification of the significance of the employee in todays labour market. The employee is no longer a servant, but a source of humans capital. In this regard, the common law tests for determining the master servant relationship which necessarily flow from the erstwhile(a) notion of master and servant, is no longer compatible with modern notions of the employee/employer relationship. There are essentially four primary reasons justifying a more robust test for determining employee status in more recent times. To begin with, the predominance of the contract of employment as a basis for identifying the employees status does not take into account the relative inequality of bargaining power between the employee (the weaker party) and the employer.8 These inequities compromise the extent to which the employee whitethorn bargain for and obtain specific benefits under the contract of employment. The fact is, a sel f-employed worker pull up stakes obviously be responsible for its own salary and health and safety at work.9 Secondly, the