8 minute read
Integrating the vaccinated and non-vaccinated
As workplaces open up after nearly 18 months of home working, employers are facing a new raft of dilemmas created by Covid-19. Abigail Maino reports
INTEGRATING THE VACCINATED AND NON-VACCINATED A Covid dilemma
While some businesses may continue to keep their teams working predominantly from home, for others, there is a real need to encourage employees back into the workforce.
With the majority of people now vaccinated, the risk of transmission in the workplace is mitigated, but what happens when employees choose not to be vaccinated, creating anxiety amongst their vaccinated colleagues?
The short answer is that, by law, employers cannot force their staff to be vaccinated. There is an exception for staff in care homes where vaccinations have been made compulsory, but even that legislation has a number of exceptions to it. With the prospect of offi ces having a mix of vaccinated and unvaccinated staff, employers are now looking at how to handle the delicate situation when the vaccinated person does not want to sit, or even enter an offi ce, where there are colleagues who have not had the vaccination.
A considered approach is always recommended. The fi rst step is for the employer to have a conversation with the vaccinated employee to understand their particular concerns and whether those
concerns could be eased by some kind of adjustment in the workspace, for example, sitting in a different area, installing additional screening or ensuring extra ventilation.
One option open to the vaccinated employee might be a flexible working request if they have the required length of service. The employer would then need to carefully consider their request in line with the relevant legislation. Although employees may well argue that they have been working perfectly well from home for the last 18 months, there is a recognition now that homeworking has, in many cases, been an imperfect solution.
If, after all options have been looked at, the employee then refuses to come back to work, the onus is on the employer to consider all options carefully before any formal action is taken. These considerations include whether there was a specific underlying reason, such as a disability, which would potentially require an employer to objectively justify the requirement for the purposes of the Equality Act or consider reasonable adjustments. If the conclusion is that the employee could reasonably be required to return to work, then it is possible the next stage could be an investigation for misconduct for failure to follow a reasonable management instruction.
However, many employers have, to date, been quite cautious before taking any formal action like this, in view of the changing landscape of Covid. Most prefer to have a dialogue to see if alternative solutions can be found. Even in situations where the entire workforce is back in the office, there is still a minefield of tensions that could arise between
those who are vaccinated and unvaccinated. For example, if vaccinated staff have to cover for unvaccinated colleagues who become ill.
The best policy for employers is to be clear from the outset. Employers have to assume that they are not going to be able to compel employees to be vaccinated and there is going to be a minority who will be unvaccinated. Difficult issues could arise and the best thing for an employer to do is to be clear in advance what will happen when those issues arise so there are no surprises.
Finally, employers have a legal responsibility to carry out Covid-safe risk assessments to ensure the health and safety of their workforce so that the steps have been taken to reduce the risk of transmission, as far as this is reasonably practical.
Ultimately vaccination is only one of a series of measures to manage the risk of transmission in the workplace. The reality at present is that we don’t know whether the vaccine efficacy will reduce in time, or whether there may be new variants that could impact the effectiveness of the vaccine. That’s why it remains so important to implement the other guidance in the workforce.
Abigail Maino is a Partner in DMH Stallard’s Employment team. She can be contacted on 01483 467412 or by email at abigail.maino@dmhstallard.com
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The UK will host the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow on October 31st – November 12th 2021
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Poorer countries are being told by the west to reduce their land clearance, stop chopping down their rainforests, preserve their wild animals, stop burning coal, stop dumping plastic and much more. Can you imagine their disgust at being told this by the very countries that have been encouraging and paying them to do it for 100 years, have been raping their resources to fuel our drive to modernisation and industrialisation and have enjoyed all the fruits without a thought for them and the poverty and deprivation many of them suffer. Now we have cocked it all up we are telling them that they must stop trying to do what we have been doing for generations. It’s a little like the west gorging on ice-cream and then telling the poor countries to do all the exercise.
In 2021, Earth reached a bleak milestone: The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere hit 150% of its value in preindustrial times, according to the U.K. Met Office. To prevent the worst effects of climate change, the world needs to decrease net emissions of carbon dioxide to zero by 2050. That is ZERO in 29 years time.
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In this special feature on the Climate Catastrophe, we have highlighted just a few of the major problems facing us all. Not future generations but us, today, right now.
