Redundancy, Restructuring and TUPE

Redundancy, Restructuring and TUPE

A redundancy situation may arise where there is a need to reduce the workforce, for example where the school or college has forecast a deficit, has a falling roll or where curriculum changes mean that the need for particular staff has diminished.

Restructuring of the workforce can occur in the context of a redundancy situation but does not necessarily entail a staffing reduction: sometimes there is a need to change existing contracts of employment - such as the hours that people work or the tasks that they perform - to better suit the changing needs of the organisation, but the same number of people are still required to perform the work.

TUPE, conversely, applies in very particular scenarios defined in law whereby an organisation or a service transfers to a new employer (TUPE refers to the Transfer of Undertaking (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006, as amended). The aim of TUPE law is predominantly to safeguard employees' rights where their employment changes hands. This might occur, for example, when a maintained school converts to become an academy or where a service (such as cleaning or caretaking) is insourced, outsourced or where there is a change of contractor.

All these areas of changing staffing need engage sometimes complex areas of law and it is advisable that HR and/or legal advice is taken on the particular circumstances before embarking on a change exercise. The resources in this collection are intended to help support schools and colleges with implementing such workforce change programmes.

What's in this topic collection:

This topic collection covers redundancy, restructuring and TUPE which can be broadly grouped under the heading of 'managing workforce change' and therefore have a number of similarities, not least in terms of the legal requirement to consult. Guidance and templates are supplied to cover redundancy handling and consultation activities and our TUPE guidance covers the common scenario of service-provision changes as well as signposting further DfE information on academy transfers.