Toward a Right to Redundancy Compensation

Abstract

In Brighouse Ltd v Bilderbeck (1995) the Court of Appeal held that in some circumstances a worker might be entitled to compensation for redundancy, even though his or her contract of employment did not provide for it. The decision has attracted sustained and vociferous criticism. In the opinion of its detractors, if the deeision is not actually contrary to the terms of the Employment Contracts Act then it is certainly inconsistent with "the clear intentions of the Government..." (Kerr, 1995: 97, 99).