{"id":3967,"date":"2015-04-30T16:26:17","date_gmt":"2015-04-30T15:26:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=3967"},"modified":"2015-04-30T16:26:17","modified_gmt":"2015-04-30T15:26:17","slug":"employment-practices-1215-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=3967","title":{"rendered":"Employment practices 1215-style"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Unite member Reverend Mark Sharpe, like faith workers up and down the country, carried out duties on a full-time basis in exchange for pay \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what we in a modern democracy governed by the rule of law would by all accounts consider a job.<\/p>\n

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But an appeal decision made today (April 30) overturned a previous employment appeal tribunal (EAT) ruling that originally found Rev. Sharpe was an employee and entitled to employment protection rights.<\/p>\n

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Today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s judgment deals a sharp blow to faith workers and hearkens back to early medieval times, looking back over 800 years to the Magna Carta and historical texts to when the Holy Roman Empire was formed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Church argued that instead of being an employee, Rev. Sharpe should be considered a \u00e2\u20ac\u015breligious office holder\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 under ecclesiastical law, and therefore he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to be covered by employment protections.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As UniteLive reported in February<\/a>, Rev. \u00c2\u00a0Sharpe claimed he had been driven out of his parish in Worcestershire after he and his family suffered a four-year campaign of harassment from 2005 to 2009, including his dog being poisoned, his tyres slashed and his mail tampered with.<\/p>\n

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The original ruling found that Rev. Sharpe and the Church of England were in an employee\/employer relationship and so ruled that the Church had failed to protect him in the line of duty.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Anachronistic throwback<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe are massively disappointed by today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s judgement against Rev. Sharpe,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Unite national officer Sally Kosky. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis decision doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t reflect what goes on in the modern world of work. Rather, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an anachronistic throwback to a bygone era.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWhen you look at what faith workers do on a daily basis \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the work they carry out \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what any right thinking person would consider a job. The case should have been a simple one based on employment law.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe are also disturbed by the fact that the original EAT judgement was overturned by judges with no meaningful employment law background,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Kosky went on to say. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe original judgement ruling in favour of Rev. Sharpe was presided over by a senior judge who understood the law and was keen to extend employment rights to faith workers that they rightly deserve.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bCongregations would be shocked at the lack of protection that their clergymen and women have in places of worship,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt places faith workers in a dangerous situation, in which whistle blowers are cowed into silence over potential scandals and can become the victims of harassment with no legal redress.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe will be considering the judgement fully and deciding on our next steps over the coming days.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unite member Reverend Mark Sharpe, like faith workers up and down the country, carried out duties on a full-time basis in exchange for pay \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what we in a modern democracy governed by the rule of law would by all accounts consider a job.   But an appeal decision made today (April 30) overturned […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3968,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[233,293],"wps_subtitle":"Tribunal rules vicar doesn't need job protections ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3967"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3967"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3969,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3967\/revisions\/3969"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}