is everyone entitled to the royal wedding bank holiday?

[kentba8790]

my employer says they are not forced to give us it off

[PipinHull]

There have been about 20 posts already on this site asking this question - no, they do not have to allow you the day off.

[boxtops]

No, it's not a Bank holiday as I understand it, it's a public holiday, not the same thing. My employers haven't made up their mind yet.

[Buenchico]

Employment law only fixes the minimum number of days paid holiday you must receive each year. It doesn't determine when they should be. Most employees who're are given a day's holiday on the extra bank holiday will simply find that they lose a day somewhere else in the year. The following is copied and pasted from my post on another thread:

Public holidays have no significance whatsoever in employment law. they're 'just another day'. If, for example, someone normally works on the day of the week upon which Christmas Day falls, their employer has every right to demand that they attend work on that day, at their normal rate of pay. If the employee failed to attend, they could be disciplined.

The only statutory right to paid holidays relates to the total number of days holiday per year. It's 5.6 times the number of days worked each week (capped at 28 days). So an employee working 5 days per week will have a statutory entitlement to 28 days paid holiday. The employer is free (subject to providing reasonable notice) to determine when those days are taken. It would be perfectly lawful for an employer to say that someone's holidays were the first Tuesday and the fourth Thursday in every month, with the second Wednesday in the first four months. The employee would never get 3 days in a row off, yet alone a week or a fortnight to go away, but the law would have been complied with.

All that designating the Royal Wedding Day as a public holiday has done, for some people, is to force them to be on holiday on that date (thus losing a day's holiday at another time of the year, when it would have been more convenient for them).

Chris

[THECORBYLOON]

Boxtops, in December last year, it was proclaimed a Bank Holiday in England, Wales and Ulster. The Scots Government also said it would be a Bank Holiday in Scotland.

[boxtops]

Was it, corbyloon? - I must have misunderstood that. Not sure then how my public sector employer is enterpreting this - we have 8 BH p.a. in our contracts.

[THECORBYLOON]

It was announced in the London Gazette, http://www.london-gaz...tegory=proclamations. The local newsagent must have run out of them when when you popped in on that day...

[bednobs]

hi BT, i am also in the public sector and in my contract they don't state the number of bank holidays. This is because the year runs from april, so some years you might get 10 (for example if Easter is in April one year and March the next)

[dotty.]

it's a bank holiday, an extra days holiday has been allocated to all entielments, this means that if you work it you get a days holiday in lieu, if you take it off you take it as a days holiday, as it falls 2 days before th amyday monday and 3 days after easter monday, many many people will have it off as annual leave

[factor-fiction]

Is that right, dotty? Do you a mean a day has been added to the MINIMUM statutory entitlement? Where an employer already offers well above the statutory minimum for holidays I'd be surprised if the government would interfere and force them to give an extra day.
Besides, I work in a school and we have just been told we are still awaiting a decison by the government on whether schools will be open or closed on that day.

[Buenchico]

Sorry, Dotty is wrong.

The minimum statutory holiday entitlement (for someone who works 5 or 6 days per week) is simply "28 days" (NOT "20 days plus public holidays"). Thus the creation of an additional public holiday does NOT add to the statutory entitlement.

Some employers may choose to operate a policy whereby they give "20 days plus public holidays", instead of "28 days" but that's entirely up to them (or a matter for individual contracts between employer and employee). The STATUTORY entitlement is NOT affected.

The vast majority of people in the country will either simply not receive any additional holiday allowance or, worse, lose a day off later in the year because they're forced to take a day off on the Royal Wedding day.

As I've written above, public holidays have no significance whatsoever in employment law.

Chris

[factor-fiction]

Good answer, Buenchico.

[THECORBYLOON]

Don't know why but several times now dot has made assertions about employment rights that may have applied to her and then gone on to suggest they apply to everyone. It's like me saying that everyone gets a day off for the Queen's Birthday and a half-day for Maundy Thursday.

[JonnyBoy12]

Oh, are they not obliged to do this. I want to have it off all day, if I have a job by then. Some of us on here are between jobs, so spare a thought for us unwaged.

[boxtops]

We still don't know for certain - but we have 8 BH in each year's contracts so we'll have to see how it pans out.

[THECORBYLOON]

A lot of folk think they MUST be given time off for bank holidays and MUST be paid extra for working overtime or on Bank Holidays but that is not the case.

[Hopkirk]

Did you know that ChristmasDay is not a bank holiday in England and Wales?

[THECORBYLOON]

Yup!!!

[Hopkirk]

Damn.

I thought that little grenade would cause a stir.

[dotty.]

did you know that there is another extra bank holiday on 5th june 2012 for the golden jubilee and that the spring bank holiday has been put back a week to 4th june instead of the last monday in may that year?
and it may be several times now that i have mentioned whatever it is you say i have mentioned but I speak from a general understanding of how a huge number of retailers treat their staff, niot just my employer, i don;t keep mentioning it just so that the same people can keep tellign me i am wrong, quite whichever statutes you like, i'll just keeo speaking to real people that are actually getting the holidays i am talking about.