Resolving contractual conflicts
by Philip
Employers who recognise Trade Unions will often have collective agreements with the Trade Union which cover employees in the bargaining unit. The case reported here answers some old chestnuts that crop up from time to time:
1. A collective agreement is an agreement between a Trade Union and an employer, provisions within that collective agreement cannot be directly enforced by an employee as he was not a party to the agreement, unless the agreement was incorporated into the employee’s contract of employment.
2. Where an individual employee’s contract conflicts with a collective agreement, in this case over a weekend working allowance, then the contract normally trumps the collective agreement as the contract is a bespoke document for the individual employee whereas a collective agreement is a generic document which covers a group of employees, of which the individual employee may be a part.
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