Health Protection Agency Act 2004

Section 8

SCHEDULE 2 Transfer of property and staff, etc.

Transfer schemes

1 (1) The property, rights and liabilities which may be the subject of a scheme include—

(a) any that would otherwise be incapable of being transferred or assigned, and

(b) rights and liabilities under a contract of employment.

(2) A scheme may define the property, rights and liabilities to be transferred by specifying or describing them (including describing them by reference to a specified part of the transferor’s undertaking).

(3) A scheme may include supplementary, incidental, transitional and consequential provision.

Transfer

2 The property, rights and liabilities which are the subject of a scheme are, by virtue of this paragraph, transferred on the day appointed by the scheme in accordance with the provisions of the scheme.

Employment

3 The transfer by paragraph 2 of the rights and liabilities relating to an individual’s contract of employment does not break the continuity of his employment, and, accordingly—

(a) he is not to be regarded for the purposes of Part 11 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (c. 18) (redundancy payments etc.) or Part XII of the Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (S.I. 1996/1919 (N.I. 16)) as having been dismissed by virtue of the transfer, and

(b) his period of employment with the transferor counts as a period of employment with the transferee for the purposes of that Act or Order.

4 (1) Paragraph 2 does not operate to transfer the rights and liabilities under an individual’s contract of employment if, before the transfer takes effect, he informs the transferor or transferee that he objects to the transfer.

(2) Where an individual does inform the transferor or transferee as specified in sub-paragraph (1), his contract of employment with the transferor is terminated immediately before the date on which the transfer would occur; but he is not, for any purpose, to be regarded as having been dismissed by the transferor.

(3) This paragraph does not affect any right of an individual employed by a transferor to terminate his contract of employment if (apart from the change of employer) a substantial change is made to his detriment in his working conditions.

5 For the purposes of this Schedule, where a person holds any office or employment under the Crown on terms which do not constitute a contract of employment between that person and the Crown—

(a) he shall be regarded as employed by the Crown by virtue of a contract of employment;

(b) the terms of his employment shall be regarded as constituting the terms of that contract; and

(c) in relation to such a person, the reference in paragraph 4(2) to dismissal by the transferor is to termination of his employment by the Crown.

Transitional

6 (1) Anything done by or in relation to the transferor for the purposes of or in connection with anything transferred by paragraph 2 which is in effect immediately before it is transferred must be treated as if done by or in relation to the transferee.

(2) There may be continued by or in relation to the transferee anything (including legal proceedings) relating to anything so transferred which is in the process of being done by or in relation to the transferor immediately before it is transferred.

(3) A reference to the transferor in any document relating to anything so transferred must be taken (so far as necessary for the purposes of or in consequence of the transfer) as a reference to the transferee.

(4) A transfer under paragraph 2 does not affect the validity of anything done by or in relation to the transferor before the transfer takes effect.