Author Archives: wonkypolicywonk

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About wonkypolicywonk

Wonkypolicywonk is a recovering policy minion, assigned wonky at birth.

Wish you were here, Minister

Posted on December 8, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

Batting for the ‘have nots’ rather than the ‘haves’, lefty policy wonks like me don’t get to claim many policy wins – we spend most of our professional lives banging our world-weary heads against very well constructed brick walls. I … Continue reading →

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To name & shame, or not to name & shame, that is the question

Posted on November 9, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

In August, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) named & shamed another 233 employers for non-compliance with the national minimum wage. Not surprisingly, press and media coverage of this round of naming & shaming – the 12th … Continue reading →

Posted in Workers' rights | Tagged , | 6 Comments

ET fees: the backlash starts

Posted on September 24, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

The much belated but very welcome victory for common sense and the common law – the latter being a fairly straightforward legal concept seemingly long forgotten by the allegedly planet-sized brains in the High Court and Court of Appeal – … Continue reading →

Posted in Justice, Workers' rights | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

ET fees: Supreme Court dumps on Clarke, Cable & Grayling

Posted on July 26, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

🙏💻🙏📱🙏 👀💻👀📱👀 😀👀😄👀😃👀😆👀😝👀😂 🚫💷🚫 💥🎉👏🍸🍻🍷🎉🍺🎂🍸🍻 👏❤️💋 Supreme Court judges 💋❤️👏 👏👊😍 Adam Creme, Shantha David & Unison 😍👊👏 👏👊😎 Dinah Rose QC & Michael Ford QC 😎👊👏 👏👍😇 Caspar Glyn QC, Sean Jones QC, Darren Newman, Abi Adams & Jeremias Prassl 😇👍👏 😱⚠️ Ken Clarke, Vince Cable & … Continue reading →

Posted in Justice, Workers' rights | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Give me six. Why not?

Posted on July 7, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

Extend the time limit for submitting an employment tribunal claim – from three months to six months – in cases of pregnancy or maternity discrimination. Hmmm. Yep, I was pretty sceptical when serious people – including Equality & Human Rights … Continue reading →

Posted in Equality, Justice, Workers' rights | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

ET fees: lies, damn lies, and Ministry number-crunching

Posted on June 14, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

Previously on this blog, I had a pop at the Ministry of Injustice’s attempt – in its laughably poor report of its laughably poor internal review of the ET fees regime introduced in July 2013 – to put a figure on … Continue reading →

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ET fees: a statistical injustice

Posted on June 9, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

The quarterly employment tribunal (ET) statistics issued by the Ministry of Injustice haven’t been terribly newsworthy since the figures became somewhat lacking in variability in mid-2014. So there was very little chance of the latest set – published at 9.30am … Continue reading →

Posted in Justice, Workers' rights | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

BEIS: Not so good with the name thingies.

Posted on May 25, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

“I’ve never been too good with names,” sang Evan Dando and The Lemonheads on the title track of their fifth album It’s a shame about Ray in 1992. The song (and the album) is an indie classic that has easily … Continue reading →

Posted in Workers' rights | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

There you go, Theresa May. Fixed that Brexit White Paper foreword for you.

Posted on February 5, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk
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On an allotment, somewhere in London N1 …

Posted on January 29, 2017 by wonkypolicywonk

Aide 1: So, we switch our vote on the EU (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill. As a show of defiance against Trumpzi isolationism. Aide 2: Even May’s own MPs are appalled by what she’s done. She’s on the back foot. We … Continue reading →

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