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14 July 2020
The Employment Appeal Tribunal ruled that Royal Mail and its subsidiary Angard Staffing lost their appeal against a decision that workers for Royal Mail are indeed agency workers and therefore entitled to the same employment rights as other Royal Mail employees.
Angard Staffing was established in 2011 and is the dedicated recruitment partner for Royal Mail. While the business is part of Royal Mail, it has been outsourced to Reed Specialist Recruitment to manage.
The Tribunal found that D Kocur, who had worked for Angard since 2015, is an ‘agency worker’ within the meaning of Regulation 3 of the Agency Workers Regulations. An appeal against that decision made in August 2019 by Angard Staffing Solutions and Royal Mail Group, was dismissed.
Under the Agency Workers Regulations 2010, agency workers have a right to no less favourable treatment compared to employees who are employed by the end user (in this case the Royal Mail).
The issue turned on whether Kocur was “supplied” by the agency Angard Staffing to “work temporarily” for the hirer Royal Mail. The Tribunal had correctly directed itself in accordance with Moran v Ideal Cleaning Services Limited [2014] IRLR 172 that “temporary” meant “not permanent”.
Having found as a fact that each and every assignment was for a defined period by reference to a particular shift or shifts, it concluded that Kocur was supplied to work temporarily.
Between January 2015 and January 2019, Kocur worked regularly and frequently on shifts at the Leeds mail centre. In January 2019 he was suspended, and that is the subject of one of his complaints to the Tribunal.
Summing up the position, Judge Auerbach said that the Employment Tribunal had carefully looked at all the factors- not just Kocur’s contract with Angard Staffing Solutions, but also what happened in practice and had correctly interpreted case law in coming to its conclusions.
Shazia Khan, Partner at law firm Irwin Mitchell, which represented Kocur and other claimants, said, “My clients are delighted that the EAT recognised this appeal for what it was- another shameless attempt by Angard Staffing Solutions and Royal Mail to treat my clients as second class citizens by denying them their Agency worker rights.
Referencing a recent accusation against Royal Mail, Khan said, “We are disappointed that the unfavourable treatment continues with the failure to provide equal access to provision of PPE and hand sanitisation bottles to my Agency worker clients as compared to Royal Mail workers. My clients have further been denied the £200 recognition payment awarded for the role postal workers continue to play during the Covid-19 crisis. The payment has apparently only been made to Royal Mail colleagues and not Agency workers in recognition of their efforts during the pandemic.”
“The Employment Tribunal made it very clear that Kocur and my clients are agency workers and should be treated in the same way as Royal Mail’s own employees. Perhaps Royal Mail and Angard Staffing Solutions will now finally take this on board,” Khan said.
A Royal Mail spokesperson said, “We value the work and commitment of all individuals who work in our business. We will reflect on the Judgment of the Employment Appeal Tribunal and will consider an appeal to the Court of Appeal.”
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