The parliament of the UK is the one who make a law. Parliament have 3 chamber in which include House of Common, House of Lord and Monarch. In a first place, a bill is propose new law or existing law and come from government, opposite party, civil service groups etc. The types of bill is public, private, government and private member’s bills (Parliment, 2014).
In first stage, government proposal called green paper to present government idea and future policies, published in public discussion for interest groups. When fine new is govern, white paper is published. When confirm the bill cabinet ministers decide to go a forward and cabinet ministers introduce the bill into the House Common. This is a first reading and purely formal stage and there is no debate on the bill (Parliment, 2014).
In a second reading, debate on the main principle of the bill and government ministers will open the debate by setting out the case for the bill and explain it provision. At the end of the debate house will vote on the bill and if the vote is lost by the government cannot be proceed any more.
Committee stage is a line-by-line consideration of the detail bill. This process carried out by specially convened committee of MPs. In a report stage, discus only amendments. Third reading is the general discussion of the bill and no amendment is possible in this stage (Parliment, 2014).
Last stage, both house must agree on the text of a bill before it can be become an act. This mean that a bill move backward and forward between the two houses once both house agree. A bill that both house passed the law and goes the Monarch royal assent (Parliment, 2014).
Statute law, refers to law that has been created by Parliament in the form of legislation. When Statutory Law applied in Court, some kind of thing they did not understand in the Statute Law they will look at interpretation. The rule that there are using golden rule, betrayal rule class rule and striatal rule. Even applied these rules and court want more clarification court will see the process of the constitution and use extended material.
The ‘common law’ means the substantive law and procedural rules that have been created by the judges through the decisions in the cases they have heard which develop over period of years. Over the years equitable principle started applying big part of developing common law and give fair and just. For example, entire body of contract law base on a common law. Under the Contract Law, Adams v Lindsell (1818) 106 ER 250 the defendant wrote to the claimant offering to sell them a few wool and requesting a reply 'within the course of post'. The letter was delayed in the post. On receiving the letter the claimant posted a letter of acceptance the same day. but, because of the delay the defendant's had assumed the claimant become no longer interested in the wool and sold it directly to a third party. The claimant sued for breach of contract. Equitable principle applies and court say post is the agreed form of verbal exchange among the parties and the letter of acceptance is correctly addressed and includes the proper postage stamp. The acceptance then becomes effective when the letter is posted (Sarah Riches & Vida Allen, 2009).
Evaluate the effectiveness of the legal system in terms of recent reform and developments.
Employment Act 2002, brought to know the person before they got an employment what are the disciplinary and dismissal procedures in that company and ask to give a copy to employment before employment begin. It introduces new provisions concerning 'family-friendly' working, the decision of individual disputes on the workplace, equal treatment for fixed-term employees and other matters. This feature summarizes its most important necessities and the timetable for their implementation, and looks at organization and trade union perspectives of the new law.
TUBE act 2006, when transferring the company, owner of the company did not pay employee salary and did not inform about the owner of the company is change and what will happen the employees when the ownership change. Sometimes new ownership also do not know these thing when they handover the company. Cause of these dirty thing TUBE Act 2006 came. In this Act, transferor have to give information to the new operator in written or readily accessible form in regard to the identities of those employee who are transferring and their employment rights and liabilities. Employees got chance to agree or not in that variation. The main aim of this act is ensure that, in connection with the transfer and employment is protected.
Some organization hired employees based on age, gender and religious. Some employee less salary causes of the sex or disability but they worked same hour and complete works same as others. Equality Act 2010 brought the solution these problem and brings 116 separate piece of legislation into one single Act. This Act protects individual from unfair treatment and promotes fair and more equal society (commision, 2019). This will impact on business various ways depend on the situation.
Using specific examples illustrate how company, employment and contract law has a potential impact upon business
Employment, Company and Contract law impact many ways in many situations. Under the employment law have a discrimination act. as a business if hiring and recruiting employee to a company is important to know the direct and indirect discriminations. Company should not be preference specific gender, race or age. According to this Act these are now illegal and impact on the business. Another important thing under the employment law is Health and Safety Act. Environmental law will impact business operation, agencies must discover environmental and friendly ways of disposing of waste in order to not make a contribution to pollutants. They can be determined negligible. This impacts the health and safety of workforce employees and the general public. Employees or the public can litigate for negligence if they can proof that their loss or damages was due to the enterprise poor health practices. This can impact the business reputation (Goodwill) profit margin and much less confidence from stakeholders within the business (JAMES, 2016).
Under the Company Law have a Consumer Protection Act. The Act requires the trader to ensure that the written terms in a consumer contract are transparent and prominent. For a term to be “transparent” it must be in plain and intelligible language and be legible. A term is “prominent” if it is brought to the consumer’s attention before they enter into the contract. And the contract terms must fair. For example, most businesses that make products offer a warranty, which is a promise to buyers. A warranty explains what the manufacturer will do if the product is faulty. If they are not treat the way they written in the warranty will lead to impact on business (Muckle, 2015).
Contract law impacts corporations due to the fact all agencies are either offering a service or they’re offering a product which means that they have to purchase, they have to resell, or they have to render services. For each and every one of these transactions, a contract should be in place. That contract states whether those services are being purchased or offered at the precise price and what the terms and conditions are. For example, two parties are agree to supply some product with specification and with time limitations. Supplier supply the product to given period but some specification are differ to the contract they agreed and did not accept product. This will impact on the business (getsmarter, 2016).
Select two business problems. For each problem case presented you must apply and justify a legal solution to the problem.
Problem 1
John and Marry are two employee of Hotel A and two are receptionist. The responsibility, working hours, qualification and skill level are same. After couple months, Marry noticed John gets more money base on her salary. When Marry talk to John regarding this issue, she knows salary was same but service charge was less than john. When she talk Human Resource Department, they told her service charge was given base on work that employees were given. HR department believe that man were more worked than the women.
In this situation, the problem is sex or gender discrimination. According to the GOV.UK (2019) it is direct sex discrimination to treat someone less favorably because of their sex than someone of the other sex would be treated in the same circumstances. Famous case Coleman v Skysail Ltd (1981) are related to this case. In this case, better to get help from mediator to solve the problem because in this process have less formalities and less cost. Even this process marry did not get fair solution marry can appeal an Employment Tribunal with the evidence against Hotel A. Equality Act 2010 says if someone treat less favorably because of their sex than someone of the other sex would be treated in the same circumstances is illegal.
Problem 2
Mr. Joseph and Wooden Company made a written contract to made 100 chairs (Black) within the week. But after week also Wooden Company cannot deliver Mr. Joseph chair. After 1 day, Wooden Company delivered chair but Mr. Joseph noticed 10 chair was miss and the color also not black.
Above case is clearly contract violation case. Moreover Mr. Joseph have not received the exact thing his ordered therefore the company is also violating consumers’ right. According to the Consumer right Act 2015, Mr. Joseph have every right to query about goods sales contract, transfer contracts as well as the quality and quantity of the goods. In this case, Mr. Joseph ordered black 100 chairs while he received 90 chairs (not black) and after one day (Cuniberti, 2014). According to the 29 (1) and (2) of CRA the goods quality and time of shipping are the responsibility of trader. Moreover in accordance to 3(a) and 3(b) of CRA the conditional sales contract is absolutely violated right here. For the delivery of the products the 28(3) defines that goods should be exact as according to contract and overdue delivery can cause penalty according to 28(6) of consumer right act 2015. Finally the quality of the goods is not satisfactory. Consequently you could take the help of S9 of CRA 2015 which defines the term satisfactory quality as described in the sales agreement between the customer and trader. In this example the color in the contract turned into black which isn't same after delivery. So Mr. Joseph standards have not met according to the sales contract. Therefore strive 19(6) section of CRA 2015 which gives Mr. Joseph have the right to reject products when they are not as per the prior agreement (Mike Holcombe & Florentin Ipate, 2012)
For above two selected business problems apply an alternative solution in reference to the legal framework of Sri Lanka
According with the constitution, there cannot be any discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, language, caste, sex, political opinion, place of birth or any individual of such grounds. There is no special provision in constitution or labor laws to prevent discrimination in employment associated matters. Laws also prohibit discrimination against disabled humans in subjects of employment as well as employees involved in union activities (Wage Indicator Foundation, 2019).
Constitution of Sri Lanka offers each person the right to apply to the Supreme Court in respect of violations of fundamental rights by way of the state (executive action). It is not clear whether individuals can achieve redressed with recognize to discrimination by the private sector employers (Wage Indicator Foundation, 2019). So according to this Marry can appeal to the Supreme Court against Hotel A.
Above case is clearly contract violation case. Moreover Mr. Joseph have not received the exact thing his ordered therefore the company is also violating consumers’ right. According to the Unfair Contract Term Act 4(1) and (2), Mr. Joseph have every right to query about goods sales contract, transfer contracts as well as the quality and quantity of the goods. According to the Contract Term Act 4(1) say between parties to a contract where one of the parties deals as consumer or on the other's written standard terms of business. In this case, Mr. Joseph ordered black 100 chairs while he received 90 chairs (not black) and after one day. According to the 4 (2) As against that party the other cannot by reference to any contract term— except in so far as (many of the cases mentioned in this subsection) the contract term satisfies the requirement of reasonableness (Black Hall Publishing, 2017). Mr. Joseph can complain a compensation against the Wooden Company in a court.
Compare and contrast the effectiveness of these recommendation
In both country fundament right are protected. In UK, gender discrimination define by law Equality Act 2010 but Sri Lanka constitution define the discrimination and so old. Equality Act more describe than the Sri Lankan Constitution. According to Sri Lankan Constitution people can appeal Supreme Court in first instance while UK first complain in the Tribunal or Magistrate Court.
However, in a second case both country very similar descriptions and both country have very recent Acts. In a contract violation cases Sri Lankan use Contract term Act while UK use Consumer Protection Act. In both Acts detail the how contract violation are.
Conclusion
Though the business law assignment, briefly discuss the legal system and important to be aware the law to business owner and responsible people to do business. The key legislation on business is Company, Employment and Contract Law and these law potentially impact on the business.