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Other Obligations
Previous convictions
If you have 'unspent' criminal convictions, and you are asked by your employer (or prospective employer) whether you have previous convictions, you should disclose them. Failure to do so may entitle your employer to dismiss you and may also be a criminal offence.
However, under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 most convictions become spent after a period of time. If your convictions are spent you are not required to disclose them if asked whether you have any previous convictions. It will be unlawful for an employer to refuse to employ you, to dismiss you, or to subject you to any other detriment for having spent convictions. Dismissal for having failed to disclose spent convictions is automatically unfair and entitles you to claim for unfair dismissal.
However, certain jobs, offices and professions are exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. Such jobs include teachers, nurses, police officers, lawyers and magistrates. If you apply for an exempt job, office or profession, you will be asked to agree to disclose all your convictions, spent and unspent.
For more information about the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974
, when a conviction becomes spent and the exemptions from the Act see Spent Convictions and the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974
References
On leaving, your employer is not obliged to give you a reference. However, if your employer provides a reference there is a duty to take reasonable care to see that any reference is fair and accurate. There is an implied term in a contract of employment requiring the exercise of due care and skill in the preparation of a reference. If, as a result of a reference in which the writer failed to take reasonable care, the employee suffers loss, he or she may claim damages in the county court. To claim damages you must show that the reference actually was given rather than you feared that it might be. You also need to show that a prospective employer relied on it. Public funding is available. If a post-employment reference is discriminatory, you might be able to claim in respect of that illegal discrimination.
Obligation to provide work
As long as your employer pays you, they have no obligation to provide you with work. The right to work may be enforced only by:
- Employees who are offered the opportunity to earn commission or a bonus.
- Artists, actors, singers and performers whose careers are advanced by exposure.
- Highly skilled craft workers.
You are under a duty to obey instructions, provided these are lawful, reasonable and within the scope of the contract you have agreed. Other instructions will constitute breaches of the contract, for example, if you are instructed to do something, which is against the criminal law or which is unsafe, unreasonable or outside the scope of the duties you have agreed to perform. If your contract is in any way illegal, for example, because of your intention to avoid tax by being paid cash in hand, the likely consequence is that you will be unable to claim rights under it. This means that you may not be able to claim unfair dismissal or other employment rights, although illegality is less likely to affect your rights under the discrimination legislation.
Right to search
Your employer does not have the right to search you or your bag, unless you have agreed this in your contract or accepted it by long-standing custom and practice. Security officers have no general powers to search or detain you.
Time off
You have a right to time off without pay to be a member of a local council, health authority, school or college governing body, water authority, police authority, board of prison visitors or magistrates’ bench, or for jury service. The amount of time off is that which is reasonable taking into account the effect of your absence on your employer's business. If your employer refuses to let you have time off for these reasons, you can bring a claim to the Employment Tribunal.
