Do we need awareness courses for bosses, a bit like those on offer to drivers who break the law, in England and Wales?
Every year in Scotland, according to a new report, tens of thousands of employees are taken advantage of at work, with more than 46,000 incidences of unfairness reported to Citizens Advice Bureaux across the country.
One of the proposals from CAS just such a skills course for bosses.
The charity says ministers should consider setting up an employment commission to target rogue employers and help enforce employment law.
Such a commission could require employers who ignore their legal responsibilities to undertake training on basic employment rights and compensate employees who have been badly treated, it says. No single body currently exists to challenge unfair employment practices and a new body could call to account those who deny people sick pay, permit racist and sexist bullying, deny workers the minimum wage or exploit migrant workers.
In extreme cases, a commission could fine the worst offenders or name and shame those who unfairly use tools such as zero hours contracts.
All of these abuses are routinely, albeit unwillingly, tolerated by Scottish Workers, CAS explains. Some of the problems highlighted in the report are shocking and seem like relics from a bygone age. They include a pregnant care worker in the east of Scotland who, like many in the sector, was on a zero hours contract. After she told her bosses she was pregnant, she found herself given the worst jobs, and sent to the homes of obese clients where she would have to use a hoist. Another worker, after telling her manager she was pregnant was fired by a finance manager who insisted it was to do with a two month absence the previous year. This manager knew nothing, she claimed, of the pregnancy.
Other workers have been denied the minimum wage, migrant workers told they are 'training' so not entitled to full pay, employers have tolerated bullying or indeed been the culprits, while the denial of legitimate holiday sick pay made up a tenth of all complaints received by bureaux in the Citizen's Advice network.
The situation is so bad that I understand CAS considered publishing separate reports on all the different ways in which employees in Scotland are being treated unfairly.
This isn't an attack on business or employers in general. Clearly the vast majority of companies and individual employers in Scotland are fair and abide by the law. But those who do not cause misery, threatening the health, wealth and family life of those they exploit. They not only cost society through the poorer health and quality of life identified in the CAS report, they compete unfairly with responsible employers.
There should be redress already in these circumstances. But CAS are deeply worried about the fees for Employment Tribunals, which are a barrier to justice, especially when only 41% of claimants who are successful at tribunals ever receive their award in full.
An employment commission is one of many proposals for the Scottish Government and Parliament made in the report. By collating the full range of abuses currently faced by workers, CAS hope those central demands are more likely to get a hearing.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article