Getting it together: the work-life agenda and offices

This research analyses the current focus on family-friendly offices and develops a set of recommendations for office providers and operators to help them facilitate this new scenario. The main drivers of change towards family friendly offices are social policy, employers and employees. Demographic changes such as the later transition to parenthood and an increase in the number of older people in society have changed the balance between work and family. Changes in society's values and particularly in gender roles have also driven changes in working practices. Offices are adapting to demands for family-friendly workplaces. The report concludes with a number of recommendations for action which stakeholders can implement in both the short and long term to promote better work-life integration

Fully compliant? A study of data protection policy in UK public organisations

Fully compliant? A study of data protection policy in UK public organisation

Reflexive law, corporate social responsibility and the evolution of labour standards: the case of working time

Through an empirical study of working time in the United Kingdom, we explore the scope for initiatives based on corporate social responsibility (CSR) to engender voluntary action by employers to raise labour standards. Our evidence suggests that a CSR-based approach faces considerable problems of implementation in this area, in large part because the legal mechanisms which might underpin CSR ('reflexive law') have not yet been effectively developed.corporate social responsibility, labour standards

The European social dialogue: the role of management and labour in the creation of European social regulation

Proposals for social regulation at the level of the European Community have proved highly controversial. The Protocol and Agreement on Social Policy (SPA), agreed at Maastricht, provide the potential for a more expansive framework of Community social regulation by setting out wider express legal bases for social action than were previously available in the EC Treaty. The SPA also introduces into the decision making process an extended role for the representatives of management and labour, the "social partners" both in the creation and implementation of social regulation. This "social dialogue" process allows regulation to take the form either of legislation or collective agreements. The SPA applies to 14 of the 15 Member States, excluding the UK, whose Conservative Government remain staunchly opposed to increases in social regulation. This thesis aims to consider the impact of the introduction of the social dialogue process on the creation of European social regulation. After an assessment of the background to the social dialogue, the new decision making process is examined in detail. Consideration is given to the scope of the new legal bases, the practical difficulties inherent within the consultation and negotiation processes and the possibilities for the adoption of European level collective agreements. The thesis then turns to a theoretical assessment of the social dialogue in the light of the European Community's commitments to subsidiarity and democracy. The main conclusion drawn is that the SPA social dialogue has created the potential for the autonomous development of European collective labour law. However, a combination of the present inefficiencies of the social dialogue procedure and the personalities involved in the dialogue make the fulfilment of this potential unlikely in the near future

Common sense common safety

"A report by Lord Young of Graffham to the Prime Minister following a Whitehall‑wide review of the operation of health and safety laws and the growth of the compensation culture" - Cover

Reflexive regulation and the development of capabilities : the impact of the 2002/14/EC Directive on information and consultation of employees in the UK

The research evaluates the pattern of change in the field of employee representation in the UK as influenced by the transposition and implementation of the Directive 2002/14/EC establishing a general framework for informing and consulting employees in the European Community and to relate this analysis to the impact of legislation in the field of labour law and industrial relations through the location of managerial and labour practice in implementing and handling the information and consultation arrangements. Theoretically, the thesis draws on the theory of reflexive law (Teubner, 1993; Barnard and Deakin, 2002) and on the capabilities approach (Sen, 1999), which has recently emerged in political economy. Empirically, it combines textual analysis, interviews with key actors, a questionnaire survey of companies and in-depth case studies in a few organizations in the business services and the financial sectors. The research aims to move beyond the traditional socio-legal concepts and methods to incorporate insights from the institutional and political economy frames of analysis commonly deployed in the field of industrial relations, and from its tradition of empirical enquiry rooted in field-based qualitative research methods. In diverging from existing UK social norms and conventions a new role for the two sides of industry, CBI and TUC, was created that assisted in the development of the national legislation transposing the directive and led to a re-conceptualization of the EU-level norms, as stipulated by the directive, concerning information and consultation of employees. Whilst the introduction of national legislation drove to some extent the spread of voluntary arrangements, albeit at the instigation of management, there was not much evidence that the 'standard provisions' of the UK Regulations promoted institutional experimentation or to a new framework for a process of learning, participation and capabilities for voice. This was down to the nature of the legal obligations, the efficacy of the enforcement mechanisms and the degree to which extra-legal resources, mainly trade union organization, were utilized

Fully compliant? : a study of data protection policy in UK public organisations

EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Opting Out Of The 48-Hour Week – Employer Necessity Or Individual Choice? An Empirical Study Of The Operation Of Article 18(1)(B) Of The Working Time Directive In The UK

The EU Working Time Directive has so far had little impact on an ingrained culture of long-hours working in the UK. Case studies suggest that the use of individual opt-outs from the 48-hour limit on weekly working time is a principal reason for this. However, removal of the individual opt-out (currently under consideration at EU level) is unlikely to make much difference to UK practice in the absence of a wider review of working time policy. In particular, the UK’s individualised system of workplace bargaining is currently ill-placed to adapt to a continental European model of working time regulation.working time, labour standards, collective bargaining, European Union