Quarterly News

Age discrimination

On 1 October 2006 the government introduced legislation to protect people from being discriminated against on the grounds of age. The regulations include both employment and vocational training and cover people of all age ranges, both young and old.

The upper age limits for redundancy and unfair dismissal were removed and compulsory retirement under the age of 65 was made unlawful.

All employees were given the 'right to request' to work beyond the default retirement age of 65 with employers being required to follow a stringent procedure to ensure that all such requests are considered.

Employees can be retired at the default age of 65 by the employer provided the correct procedure is followed by notifying the employee between 6 and 12 months prior to their expected retirement date. The employee's contract must be terminated on the grounds of retirement only. An Employment Tribunal in Southampton recently found in favour of an employer who dismissed an employee on the grounds of retirement at the age of 65 as they had followed the statutory procedure.

Age Concern believes that this part of the legislation is in fact unlawful as it contravenes European Law and currently has a case going through the European Court of Justice (the 'Heyday' challenge). A ruling on this case is not expected until 2009.

Although this claim may change the UK age discrimination law it is unlikely that any employer currently following the current age discrimination law will be held liable for retrospective claims.

Figures published by The Tribunals Service (September 2007) indicate that out of 132,577 age discrimination cases lodged only 972 were accepted with no clear decisions on the implementation of the age discrimination policy. The newly formed Commission for Equality and Human Rights are likely to issue a code of practice which may clarify some of the aspects of the age discrimination regime.

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