The Appropriate Channels to Seek Any Compensation for Loss of Job - Assignment Example

of the SCENARIO 3    Q What are the appropriate channels for William to seek any compensation for loss of job? We have to examine the case of William by using two angles that are discriminatory attitude of the employer and harassment at the hands of employer within the working premises. Discrimination In accordance with UK law, which came into being on 1st October 2006, no employer can turn down the request of an employee on the basis of age; neither passes insulting remarks against the employee as we have seen in the case of William. To curb this practice, the government introduced 65 years as retiring age. With the introduction of retiring age, employers are now refrained from discriminating on the grounds of age, even at the time of recruitment, training, redundancy and other policies that deals with the employer and the employee’s relationship (Harris, et al 56). Harassment There is no specific law, which deals with the issue of harassment at workplace. However, an affected person can knock at the door of competent court of law to get his or her grievances redressed under the criminal law known as "Protection from Harassment Act”. In refined term, harassment in the workplace can be described as "any unwanted attention that causes offence, embarrassment, humiliation, upset". However, if it is based on sex, race or disability, the concerned discriminatory law can be invoked to get protection. Further, in serious cases, some compensation can be had inclusive of damages to hurt someone’s feelings. Offensive remarks, personal comments, jokes based on racism and sex, touching, vulgar displays, abusive language come under the purview of harassment (Harris, et al 59). In order to make his case strong against discriminatory attitude by the employer and the harassment at work premise, William may adopt the following course a) keep a diary of the incidents that took place b) witnesses of co workers c) confront harassment d) have a word with HR and e) discuss the matter with Union Representative (Harris, et al 61). It is the responsibility of the employer to protect his workers from harassment irrespective of their backgrounds. William has the option to claim compensation by registering his complain with the employment tribunal on the specified form ETI since it is a mandatory requirement. Mentioned form contains a lot of information e.g. name of the complainant, postal address, reasons for complaint, whether the complainant would like to re-instate or to lodge claim for compensation. William has the option to invoke the jurisdiction of competent Tribunal without bothering grievance procedure. By passing the grievance, procedure may lead to reduction up to 25% in any award granted by the Tribunal (Harris, et al 63). At this point of time, the said victim will send a copy of ETI form to be responded on form ET3 within 28 days. If he fails to respond within the specified period of time, there is apprehension that the Tribunal may issue impugn judgment in favour of the complainant. Before filing the complaint with the Tribunal, employee may exercise his or her option of conciliation. If conciliation fails to materialize, the compelling option for remedy is Tribunal (Harris, et al 63-64). The legal process is cumbersome with reference to calling witnesses, cross examine the witnesses by other side, engage a lawyer and to bear legal expenses. Keeping in mind the time consuming legal process, we advise William to confine himself to the process of conciliation. Q. 2. Where should William go to take action on his personal injury claim? From whom should he seek advice and what formal and informal mechanisms might he use to resolve the dispute? To analyse the claim of William with regard to personal injury, we have to have a look on the law of tort and its provisions, which provide relief to the victim of personal injury besides emotional injury. In accordance with English law, tort falls under the common law jurisdictions, which are concerning civil wrong done to anybody. It causes someone else to suffer unjust loss or harm. The liability of the person who caused tortuous deserves legal action for the harm done to an individual. The victimized individual may claim compensation or damages to the extent of his or her losses in a lawsuit filed in a competent court of law. The victim has to prove that the defendant caused him irreparable damages on passing unacceptable remarks. The cause of action should contain in the lawsuit against the defendant (Von Bar 48). In a broader spectrum, legal injuries should not be confined to physical injuries. It covers the areas of emotional, economic and reputational injuries besides flagrant violations of privacy, property and constitutional rights. Further, the torts also deal with a) road accidents b) wrong imprisonment of a prisoner c) defamatory attitude of the employer, product inefficiency, environmental hazards and copy right issues. It has been observed that many torts emanate from wilful negligence or circumstantial negligence. The person who intentionally harms another person has to face strict liability, which means the victim has to receive compensation against the damages done to him (Von Bar 51). The mentioned law has two differentiations as compared to criminal law a) it emanates from negligence and not intentional and b) burden of proof lies on the shoulder of the petitioner. It has been observed that sometimes a petitioner nominates a person in a tort case who caused harm to him and was exonerated in earlier criminal trial. Take the example of O.J. Simpson as ready reference who was acquitted by the criminal court, later on found liable on the wrongful murder under the law of tort (Von Bar 52). What would be the remedy available for tortuous loss and why the victims of tortuous loss are keen to have compensation? The reason is very simple on two counts a) to deter defendant from so doing in future and b) monetary gain at the expense of defendant. If we look it at the limited angle, the law in question would be intolerable with regard to self help as a reasonable force to shut out a trespasser. This could be the pleas of defence. In other wise scenario, where harm is in the threatening words, the court will sometimes grant interim injunction. In this respect, we may refer to the English case of Miller v Jackson of 1977. It shows command of the court other than granting monetary compensation to the victim. Sometimes, injunctions will not yield positive obligations on tort claimant. It needs specific orders from the competent court of law concerning nuisance matters (Von Bar 55). Legally, William has the right to claim compensation under law of tort against personal injury (broken foot due to slippery from stairs within the office premise). Before lodgement of complaint at an appropriate level, we should examine the relevant laws and procedures under which, a claim can be lodged (Von Bar 72). Damages Damages can be special or general in nature. According to law of torts, special damages can be measured with expenses incurred on treatment, lost of wages and property damages. The general damages require fewer costs in view of the pain and suffering and emotional distress (Von Bar 76). The compensatory amount is linked with the scale of injury. Of course, highest injury merits higher compensation. Apart from the above, under law of tort, one can get life time compensation. Here, we may cite the example of a cricketer who suffers shine bone injury, which prevents him to play cricket for life. Under the mentioned circumstances, the competent tribunal may award life time compensation (Von Bar 76). Time Limit The time limit prescribed for lodgement of claim is 3 years. William can lodge his claim with an appropriate authority within 3 years from the date of incident. Otherwise, the said claimant will lose his right to claim on the mentioned grounds. However, the competent court has the discretion to waive such limitation if justified (Von Bar 81). Q. 3. What legal support can William get for actions against the Council?   We have perused the Housing Act and found a loophole in it for the landlords and letting agents of the property. We find penalty in the said act for not protecting the deposit or required information, but interestingly there was no penalty for not doing the same within the prescribed time limit, which is 14 days. To plug this loophole, the Localism Act 2011 came in, this extended absolute time limit to 30 days to ensure tenancy deposit within the given time frame. On the last day of the month, the tenant will notify the court with regard to depositing the money to the landlord even if it is deposited any time before closure of the window (Arden & Dymond 103). According to tenancy agreement, William is bound to pay the rent on due date inclusive of required service charges to the council. He may be benefitted from the said Act. If he fails to pay the rent and other charges on the given dates, the Council has the right to take action against him to recover the amount in default. In case of legal course of action, the tenant has to incur legal costs plus rent due. If it is continued, the councils may re-posses the property in use. However, the officials of the council are prohibited by law from harassing tenants. Harassment in any shape is not tolerable under the law (Arden & Dymond 105). If the council harassed William, irrespective of rent get paid or not, he may have the option to initiate legal course of action against the council in the Housing Court. Before initiating legal course of action, William should take into account the legal expenses. If he is not in a position to afoot the legal bill, he may have free legal assistance from Legal Aid society or from HPD’s Housing Counsellors as the case may be (Arden & Dymond 105). Works Cited Arden, Andrew, and Dymond, Andrew. Manual of Housing Law. Sweet & Maxwell, 2012. Harris, David, et al. Harris, OBoyle & Warbrick: Law of the European Convention on Human Rights. Oxford University Press, 2009. Miller v Jackson [1977] QB 966. Von Bar, Christian. The Common European Law of Torts: Damage and damages, liability for and without personal misconduct, causality, and defences. Vol. 2. Oxford University Press, 2000. SCENARIO 4 Q. 1. What principle(s) of public international law is threatened if one state or group of states authorises armed action within another state?  Are there any exceptions to this rule? There is no question about it that the United Kingdom has taken a key role in the war against terror. On the global side, the yeoman services of Sir Jeremy Green stock, the Permanent representative of Britain and the Chairperson of Committee on Counter-Terrorism in the United Nations contributed a lot to address the mammoth issue of terrorism. The mentioned committee established in the wake of Security Council Resolution 1373. According to which, all States under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations are bound to introduce and implement preventive measures such as flow of funding to terrorist organization, destruction of their safe heavens from where they operate, providing any kind of support to entities and individuals in terrorist activities. Further, the apex committee has the authority to collect material information from the member states about terrorist activities and the actions they have taken to bring the culprits to the task. To comply with the instructions of the apex committee of the security council of the United Nations, the United Kingdom submitted a detailed report identifying the measures to counter terrorism that have taken place in the form of Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act and subsequently received the Royal Assent on December 14, 2001 (Pantazis & Pemberton 647). After the gory incident of 9/11, sovereign states are focusing on safety and security measures of their boundaries and its inmates by checking the terrorist activities with tooth and nails. To take the bull of terrorism by the horns, the developed and the developing States introduced number of remedial measures in their respective countries. One such measure is the Terrorism Act 2006 that was approved by the United Kingdom, which came into force in the month of April. The law in question was drawn up soon after the happening of 7th July bombing attacks in London (Pantazis & Pemberton 648). Since formation of the Labour party government, we have seen five legislations to counter the terrorist activities in and around the United Kingdom. These legislations are known as a) Terrorism Act 2000 b) Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 c) Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 d) Terrorism Act 2006 and e) the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008 (Gray 61). The government also passed Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998 besides effective legislation to counter terrorism in an effective manner. Through mentioned legislation, police and security agency are empowered to investigate the matter in a harsher way. It would not be unfair to tell that Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 confers unbridled power to the police officials. However, the setting up of a camp at Guantanamo to investigate in an inhuman way is widely condemned by cross section of the society (Gray 65). Every country has its own counter terrorism laws to deal with the issue. Countries throughout Europe have their own counter terrorism laws. Efforts are being made at the level of United Kingdom to muster support of European Countries to make sure that they are one and unite against the terrorist activities. However, Human rights organizations are making hue and cry against the law because of longest period of pre charge detention of a suspect terrorist (Gray 65). The nations agree that their citizen must now allow carrying out subversive activities in another country. They are making it sure that their citizens should try such terrorists in accordance with the law of the land where the terrorist operates. Until and unless, the states unite against the menace of terrorism, it cannot be weeded out. Hence, it is utmost important for the states to respect each other and provide maximum possible assistance to the intelligence agencies to counter the terrorism activities (Gray 67). In order to meet the desired objectives and to discourage the terrorists to meet their nefarious designs, the states are united with reference to their obligation. For that purpose, three criterions have to be met. Classification of the states is needed into three clearly defined categories. One group, which comprises the United States of America and the UK are responsible to prevent subversive acts and to deal with it in accordance with law. Another group, which consisted of Continental European and South American countries, is obliged to remove the complications amongst the foreign nations. Last but not least, the third one is Soviet Union and other countries behind the curtains should consider subversive activities and propaganda against the foreign states as an offence towards peace and security of the globe (Gray 67-68). From the above contents, it has been established that locally and internationally incumbents of states are united on one point agenda that is to deal terrorism with iron hands to prevent the use of any states territory for hostile activities by any organization or state who intends to destabilize the political or social order of another foreign land. Number of countries in order to achieve their goal had signed treaties. Now, it is the duty of the ministry of law of the signatory country to ensure implementation of treaties/conventions in letter and in spirit (Gray 71). To meet the international obligations, a number of countries who had signed the treaty are duty bound to enforce treaties, conventions, domestic and the international laws in a transparent manner so that the objectives of justice and fair play could be achieved. Q. 2. How would the above apply in the case of Abdul Abdul? Before looking into the case of mastermind Abdul Ahmed Ali in connection with London bombing attackers of July 7th, we have to examine the charge framed against them by the investigating agencies and the judgment delivered by the competent trial court. According to the information available, the judges sentenced three culprits who hatched conspiracy to blow up the jet planes, standing in the Heathrow Airport during the course of flying. The three fanatics, the media used to call them, awarded incarceration for a longer period of time. However, the court keeping in minds the role of Abdul Ahmed Ali, awarded him 40 years rigorous imprisonment. During the course of trial, one of the judge in the bench remarked about the incident as "the most grave and wicked conspiracy” to get killed thousands of people ever witnessed in the history of the United Kingdom (Clements). In the opinion of Mr. Justice Henriques, another judge of the case exclaimed that this could be the revenge of post 9/11 action of the European States. He further added that "there is every likelihood his plot would have succeeded but for police and the security service." (Clements) Other co-plotters of the plan namely Assad Sarwar had to serve 36 years of imprisonment in jail while the other convicted Tanvir Hussain was awarded 32 years of imprisonment in jail. The judges after awarding 40 years rigorous imprisonment to Abdul Ahmed Ali considered him a very dangerous criminal. Hence, they were not in favour of letting him out even after completion of sentence (Clements). While rejecting the request of the accused (now convicted) to be released on parole, the judge remarked “you are a driven and determined extremist with boundless energy and an ambition to lead a terrorist outrage”. The close circle of the Abdul Ahmed Ali is of the view that his life would be in danger even after the age of 60 years (Clements). In accordance with Home Secretary Alan Johnson the sentence itself reflected the severity of the plot to kill and maim thousands of people since they intended to blow up not one but seven jet planes within two hours during certain destinations. Ali the master mind of the plot and his teammates possessed twenty detonators. The chemical and other ingredients used in the detonators (Clements). Abdullah Ahmed Ali of Waltham stow, East London and his team mates had the chemicals used in 20 detonators, unearthed from the home of Chemist Sarwar, who hid in woods. Hussain, 28 of Leyton, East London was accused of helping in making bombs. The convicted got hold by neck as a result of thorough and extensive investigation by the United Kingdom’s investigation agencies. This has caused strict ban on carrying liquid assets by the passengers on board throughout the world. Mentioned terrorists convicted of conspiring to murder and maim large number of people (Clements). The judge accepted the plea of Islam, 31 years of age since he did not know the plot of targeting planes. The court showed some leniency by awarding him 22 years life term for conspiracy to murder number of people irrespective of their cast, creed and religion. The cases of other conspirators namely Ibrahim Savant, Arafat Waheed Khan, and Waheed Zaman charged with murder conspiracy. The competent court of law is to decide whether this case is to be tried or not (Clements). Now the case in point is under which law the case of Abdul Ahmed Ali should have been tried. After thorough study of the relevant laws, conventions and Acts, I am of the view that Abdul Ahmed Ali should have been tried in the competent jurisdiction since his crime to claim the lives of the innocent people is unpardonable. The sentences awarded to them will definitely give message to other plotters or the terrorist organizations/states they should not indulge such activities to safe their skin from getting exemplary punishment for their misdeeds. Trying offences of terrorists under the normal criminal law would not deter people of such mind set from doing the same things again and again. Q. 3. Explain the basic arguments from the theories of natural law that might be used to justify action by the ‘international community’ anywhere and at any time against those who authorise or take part in terrorist action. By reference to the scenario what are the legal objections to such arguments?  If we look at the Natural law theory, which is a component of philosophical and legal beliefs that all humans are equal and governed by the elementary laws or laws of nature. It further separates from legislated laws or non-legislated laws. Sometimes, legislated laws are considered as “positive laws” within the theoretical framework of natural law, to draw a clear distinction between natural and social laws. The influence of Natural law theory in implementing the laws and the governments of many nations in which, United Kingdom and the United States of America cannot be set aside. The readers of the natural law and the social law may have the published copy of it in the shape of Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Finnis 132). The global ideas and the cross cultures are the best examples of natural law in vogue. In view of the majority of children, fairness in disputes is the right step whereas most people around the globe consider murder as harsh infraction of natural law. Sizeable natural law theorists find their roots in the theory that all human beings are reasonable and their objectives have the dominant influence of self preservation (Finnis 133). If we peruse the natural rights, we may find it codified in legal language. Although some of the theorists argue that human beings can leave some of rights to live in a society in the name of harmony and brotherhood in spite of the basic teaching of equality and a desire to do good for the civil society remains the same. Of course there are theorists who believe in religious integration, which is a part of natural law theory (Finnis 137). Amongst the number of branches that relates to natural law theory, some of which is considered very complex. Majority of these branches use natural law as a tool of nature for thread bare discussions on the subject of positive law. In the United Kingdom, parliamentarians may refer to natural law theory that aims at to settle down disputes under the umbrella of fundamental laws of the United Kingdom in line with the concept of basic rights determined by none other than William Blackstone in the era 1760s (Finnis 137). Works Cited  Clements, Jon. "Liquid bomb plot trial: Terrorist Abdulla Ahmed Ali jailed for 40 years." 2009. Web. 25 Jul 2013. . Finnis, John. Natural law and natural rights. Oxford University Press, 2011. Gray, Christine D. International law and the use of force. Oxford University Press, 2008. Pantazis, Christina, and Pemberton, Simon. "From the ‘Old’to the ‘New’Suspect Community Examining the Impacts of Recent UK Counter-Terrorist Legislation."British Journal of Criminology 49.5 (2009): 646-666. Read More