Furloughed during maternity leave but temp resource stays. Legal or illegal?

[PCTNN]

It depends how long she has worked there. If it's less than 2 years she has no rights.

She's worked there for more than 5 years.

I see it going in 2 ways: the company keeps her on furlough and brings her back full time in x weeks/months.

Or the company makes her redundant, in which case she'll bring them to court where they'll get destroyed.

It's a small company in a small city so I hope they understand the power of word of mouth.

[mudskipper]

Before you start consulting lawyers, speak to ACAS for advice

Acas | Making working life better for everyone in Britain

Or rather get her to, as she knows the detail of the situation

[GigiBronz]

every situation should be dealt with calm and an open mind.

if that company is acting like this it could be that it is doing her a favour. I would try and get a settlement out of it but focus on finding a new role in the meanwhile.
Life is too short to spend it between narrow minded people. Depends on the job but it should not be seen as only a mean to put food on the table.

Alternative is she goes on benefits, up-skills herself and change her life in a way that she couldn't before. With more considerate changes in lifestyle her finances might end up the same.

[GhostofTarbera]

SCRATCH EVERYTHING. Just spoke to my partner. She didn't give me the exact details (or more likely, I did't get them right)

My partner's friend had been back from maternity leave for a couple of months; so there was the 2 of them (her and the temp resource/cover) both working full time for these couple of months.

Only that NOW, my partner's friend has been put on furlough (and probably will be let go), while the temp resource is being kept working full time.

New person probably better (or hotter) and want old mony face out the door, company will probably say new person is in different role etc


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[Old Greg]

It depends how long she has worked there. If it's less than 2 years she has no rights.

She has protection from discrimination, which this may or may not be.

[PCTNN]

New person probably better (or hotter) and want old mony face out the door, company will probably say new person is in different role etc

That's what I think is happening too: company wants to get rid of the woman with child because her focus is now "obviously" on the child rather than the company, and wants to keep the man who will never be distracted by this sort of things. It's a small city so wouldn't be a big surprise.

Difficult for the company to say the new person is in a different role given it was clearly advertised as a maternity cover with exact same responsibilities.

[VelcroPower]

SCRATCH EVERYTHING. Just spoke to my partner. She didn't give me the exact details (or more likely, I did't get them right)

My partner's friend had been back from maternity leave for a couple of months; so there was the 2 of them (her and the temp resource/cover) both working full time for these couple of months.

Only that NOW, my partner's friend has been put on furlough (and probably will be let go), while the temp resource is being kept working full time.

So she had not been furloughed prior to a week or so ago?

If that's the case then she actually can't be furloughed. Only employees that have served a previous period of furlough leave can be furloughed from the 1st July. She would have had to have been furloughed no later than the 10th June.

Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme: 10 June cut off and 'flexible furloughing' from July - Osborne Clarke | Osborne Clarke