Nine proposals for the reform of the law on unfair dismissal

Hugh Collins, The Institute of Employment Rights, 90 pages, £8.00

Almost everything that is wrong with the law on unfair dismissal is covered in this discussion of the current law, which also suggests amendments that would strengthen and extend protection against dismissal.

Among the nine proposed reforms are the abolition of the 12-month qualifying period for unfair dismissal, which allows employers to dismiss anyone with less than a year's service for any number of spurious reasons (except for one of the automatically unfair reasons, such as trade union membership).

It also provides a critique of the test of "fairness", which currently permits harsh dismissals as long as they are not blatantly outside the "range of reasonable responses" test applied by tribunals.