Wages Act 1986

Miscellaneous and supplemental

22 Application of Part II to superior employers: liability of employers and others in respect of offences

(1) Where—

(a) the immediate employer of a worker is himself in the employment of some other person; and

(b) the worker is employed on the premises of that other person,

that other person shall be deemed for the purposes of this Part to be the employer of the worker jointly with the immediate employer.

(2) Where the commission by any person of an offence under section 16(2) or 19(4) is due to the act or default of some other person, that other person shall be guilty of the offence; and a person may be charged with and convicted of the offence by virtue of this subsection whether or not proceedings are taken against the first-mentioned person.

(3) In any proceedings for an offence under section 16(2) or 19(4) it shall be a defence for the person charged to prove that he exercised all due diligence and took all reasonable precautions to secure that the provisions of this Part, and of any relevant regulations or order made under it, were complied with by himself and by any person under his control.

23 Offences by bodies corporate

(1) Where an offence under this Part which has been committed by a body corporate is proved to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate, or any person purporting to act in any such capacity, he as well as the body corporate shall be guilty of the offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.

(2) Where the affairs of the body corporate are managed by its members, subsection (1) shall apply in relation to the acts and defaults of a member in connection with his functions of management as if he were a director of the body corporate.

24 Transitory provisions relating to existing wages councils and wages orders

(1) As from the date of the passing of this Act

(a) a wages council within the meaning of the [1979 c. 12.] Wages Councils Act 1979 shall not exercise any functions under that Act; and

(b) the following provisions of this section shall apply to any wages order in force on that date under section 14 of that Act (" an existing order ").

(2) An existing order shall, subject to the following provisions of this section, continue in force until whichever is the later of the following times, namely—

(a) the end of the period of six months beginning with the date of the passing of this Act, and

(b) the end of the period of twelve months beginning with the date of the coming into force of the order,

and shall so continue in force notwithstanding the repeal of that Act by section 12 of this Act.

(3) If, before the later of those times, there comes into force an order made under section 14 of this Act by the wages council that made the existing order, the existing order shall cease to have effect at that time.

(4) The Secretary of State may by order—

(a) provide for all or any of the provisions of any existing order to cease to have effect;

(b) restrict the operation of all or any of the provisions of any such order by reference to any matters or circumstances whatever.

(5) As from the date of the passing of this Act nothing in any existing order shall apply to workers under the age of 21.

25 Regulations and orders made by Secretary of State under Part II

(1) The Secretary of State may make regulations for prescribing anything which by this Part is authorised or required to be prescribed.

(2) Any power to make an order or regulations conferred on the Secretary of State by this Part shall be exercisable by statutory instrument.

(3) A statutory instrument containing—

(a) an order made by the Secretary of State under section 13 (other than an order to which subsection (4) below applies) or under section 24(4), or

(b) any regulations made by him under this Part,

shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.

(4) No order to which this subsection applies shall be made by the Secretary of State unless a draft of the order has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.

(5) Subsection (4) applies to an order under section 13 which—

(a) abolishes a wages council, and

(b) does not direct that all or any of the workers previously within the scope of operation of that wages council shall be brought within the scope of operation of another wages council.

(6) A draft of such an order which would, apart from the provisions of this subsection, be treated for the purposes of the Standing Orders of either House of Parliament as a hybrid instrument shall proceed in that House as if it were not such an instrument.

(7) Any power conferred by this Part to prescribe the manner in which anything is to be published shall include power to prescribe the date which is to be taken for the purposes of this Part as the date of publication.

26 Interpretation of Part II

(1) In this Part—

• " employer ", in relation to a worker, means the person by whom the worker is (or, where the employment has ceased, was)' employed;

• " employers' association " means any organisation representing employers and any association of such organisations or of employers and such organisations;

• " employment", in relation to a worker, means employment under his contract and " employed ", in relation to a worker, accordingly means employed under his contract;

• " homeworker " means an individual who—

  (a)

  contracts with a person, for the purposes of that person's business, for the execution of work to be done in a place not under the control or management of the person with whom he contracts, and

  (b)

  does not normally make use of the services of more than two individuals in the carrying out of contracts for the execution of work in relation to which statutory minimum remuneration is provided by any order under section 14 ;

• " organisation ", in relation to workers, means a trade union and, in relation to employers, means an employers' association;

• " piece rate " means a rate where the amount of a worker's remuneration is to be calculated by reference to the number of items of work executed either by him alone or by a number of workers of whom he is one, and " piece worker " means a worker whose contract provides for the remuneration payable to him in respect of work executed by him to be calculated only by reference to one or more such rates ;

• " prescribed " means prescribed by regulations made by the Secretary of State;

• " time worker " means a worker other than a piece worker (whether the worker's remuneration is determined by reference to the actual number of hours worked by him or not);

• " wages council" (except where the context requires otherwise) means such a wages council as is mentioned in section 12(1)(a);

• " week " means—

  (a)

  in relation to a worker whose remuneration is calculated weekly by a week ending with a day other than Saturday, a week ending with that other day; and

  (b)

  in relation to any other worker, a week ending with Saturday;

• " worker " means (subject to subsection (2)) an individual who—

  (a)

  has entered into or works under (or, where the employment has ceased, worked under) one of the contracts referred to in section 8(2), or

  (b)

  whether or not he falls within paragraph above, is a homeworker,

  and any reference to a worker's contract shall be construed as a reference to any such contract as is referred to in paragraph (a) above or, in the case of a home-worker, to the contract by virtue of which he is a homeworker.

(2) In this Part " worker " does not include an individual who is wholly employed otherwise than for the purposes of the business of the person employing him.

(3) Notwithstanding section 14(3)—

(a) where a worker is employed partly for the purposes of his employer's business and partly not, nothing in any order under section 14 shall apply to the worker in his employment otherwise than for the purposes of that business, and

(b) where a worker is employed for the purposes-of his employer's business both in an employment to which an order under section 14 applies and in one to which that order does not apply, nothing in that order shall apply to the worker in the second of those employments.

(4) References in this Part to the statutory minimum remuneration provided for a worker by an order under section 14 shall—

(a) in relation to a time worker, be construed in accordance with subsection (4) of that section, and

(b) in relation to a piece worker, be construed in accordance with section 15.