Material Facts in Green V. Perk Systems Limited Case

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Part A

Material Facts in Green v. Perk Systems Limited Case

This is a case of a woman, Mrs Green, against her employers, Perk Systems Limited, regarding issues of return to work after maternity leave.  Mrs Green began working for Perk Systems Limited on June 6, 1988 as a Service Controller. At the time of her employment, she was issued with a letter of employment which not only described her position, duties, and responsibilities, but also detailed her conditions and terms of employment (Courts and tribunal Judiciary, 2015, p 7). However, the letter of employment did not specifically mention Mrs Green maternity rights in the contractual obligations section.

The contract stipulated that Mrs Green was entitled to a period of 30 weeks paid sick leave within any 12 month period. After she became pregnant in 1994, Mrs Green began a period of paid sick leave in August of that year; this was as a result of reasons related to her pregnancy. Her statutory maternity leave was supposed to commence on March 6, 1995. However, before this date – six weeks before the postulated confinement week, she wasn’t fit to work. As a result, Mrs Green gave Perk Systems Limited, her employers, a written notice that she wished to exercise her return to work exercise on February 6, 1995. Mrs Green gave birth on April 5, 1995; thus, she remained away from work in accordance to her statutory right to return to work (Browne-Wilkinson, 2001, p 14).

On September 23, 1995, the appellant wrote to her employers notifying them of her intent to return to work under section 42. This was followed with another letter on October 9, 1995 noting that she was uncertain of her return to work date and expected her employers to clarify whether she was to return on 23 or 29 October. The response she received from her employers indicated that she was expected to return to work on October 30. However, upon receiving this response, Mrs Green wrote back, on October 13, informing her employers that her return to work may be delayed and may not return to work on the expected day of return since she was still seeing the doctor for post-natal depression; in this correspondence, she enclosed the necessary doctor’s certificate. Perk Systems Limited replied to Mrs Green’s letter on October 23 and confirmed that she had the right to extend her leave by additional 4 weeks in case of medical reasons as long as they were supported by appropriate certificate from the doctor (Courts and tribunal Judiciary, 2015, p 5). A right her employers indicated was conferred by section 42(3). Despite this, Mrs Green was not able to confirm her exact date of return; in fact, she asked her employer is it was okay for her to return on November 27. Before this date, on November 13, 1995, Perk Systems Limited replied stating that although Mrs Green had the right to extend her leave by additional 4 weeks due to medical reasons, which meant that she could return to work on November 27, 1997, they would not be legally liable for hold her job for her after that date.  Despite the appeals by Mrs Green, Perk Systems Limited went ahead and held their decision not to hold her job open after November 27, 1995. Perk Systems Limited refused to allow Mrs Green to return to work despite further meeting and correspondence; however, they did not expressly dismiss her.

In this regard, Mrs Green filed a case against Perk Systems Limited for wrongful dismissal in the Industrial Tribunal. This case was dismissed forthwith by the Tribunal which argued that because Mrs Green employment at Perk Systems Limited had ended at the end of her maternity leave, her employers could not have dismissed her (Courts and tribunal Judiciary, 2015, p 5).  A subsequent appeal to the Employment Appeal Tribunal was also dismissed on the grounds that Mrs Green had failed to physically report to work in accordance with the statutory standing, which obligated her to return to work on November 27, 1995.

Legal issue(s) in the case of Green v. Perk Systems Limited

There are several legal issues in this case; first, there is a question on the rights of a woman to go for maternity leave, and secondly, there is a question on the right of a woman to return to work after the maternity leave is completed.  The right to maternity leave is a right enjoyed by all employed women, who have worked for at least a period of one year to be absent form duty during the time of pregnancy for a leave period of 14 weeks, as contained in Sections 33, 34, 35, and 36 of the Employee Protection Act 1978 (Browne-Wilkinson, 2001, p 14). The pressing question in this regard is determining the conditions under which an employee can exercise her to return to work. More importantly, is to determine the conditions under which an employee can postpone her day of return to work after the end of her maternity leave and the additional four weeks. It would also be important to determine whether or not Mrs Green and Perk Systems Limited had all complied with their obligations with regards to return to work statutory rules. Third, there is the legal issue of whether or not Mrs Green was wrongfully dismissed by Perk Systems Limited. In this regard, a legal issue to be determined is whether or not an employee can be considered not be in employed after the notified ay of return if she fails to return to work. Fourth, there is the issue of showing whether the Employment Appeal Tribunal was legally justified to uphold the ruling of the Industrial Tribunal (Browne-Wilkinson, 2001, p 14).