03 February 2022 
Julia Ascott, Employment Taxes Specialist
We are back to Pimlico Plumbers judgements. You may recall that the Supreme Court assessed that their plumbers were workers and not self-employed. On the back of this, workers have been suing for lost holiday pay. The Employment Appeal Tribunal held that claims for holiday pay should be made by the individual within 3 months of the holiday period. However, the Court of Appeal overturned this position and have allowed workers the right to holiday pay, stating:
“a worker can only lose this right of the employer can specifically and transparently show that they gave the worker the opportunity to take paid annual leave, encouraged the worker to take paid annual leave and informed the worker that the right would be lost at the end of the year.”
Friend to the HE sector, Rebecca Seeley Harris states:
“The judgment is perhaps one of the most significant I have seen for a long time when it comes to protecting workers’ rights, specifically for the entitlement to paid annual leave.
“Technically, this judgment means that any worker, be they self-employed, a gig worker, an umbrella worker, has the entitlement to paid annual leave but that the employer has to ensure that they are made aware of this.
“If they don’t, the worker does not lose the entitlement at the end of the year, it begins to accumulate. Also, it is likely that anyone who has recently finished a contract could make a claim, within three months of the end date, if they think they have been short-changed.”
This will have massive implications for any employers with current and unknown future challenges by ‘self-employed’ contractors claiming for worker rights.
