Regulation 10 MAPLE 1999

In light of the increase in redundancies and restructuring queries, we at MILS have been receiving of late, we thought it was a good time to cover the recent decision in (Carnival PLC v Hunter 2024 which reminds employers of Regulation 10 of MAPLE.

This Regulation is often missed by employers in a redundancy situation and essentially says that an employer is obliged to offer any suitable alternative employment to an employee who is on maternity leave during a redundancy exercise, even if (arguably) that employee is less suitable / qualified for the role than another employee who is not on maternity leave.  Litigation in this area is often brought on what is or what isn’t “suitable” enough in terms of the job role to be caught by MAPLE leading to the obligation to offer it to a woman on maternity leave in preference to another person at risk of redundancy.

Facts

In this case the employer was going through a redundancy / restructuring exercise and the number of people in the Claimant’s role was being reduced from 21 to 16.  The Claimant argued she should have been offered one of the remaining roles in accordance with Regulation 10 of MAPLE.

The EAT disagreed with this analysis and made clear that the decision to reduce head count in a particular job role here meant that no suitable alternative vacancies had been created for the purposes of Regulation 10.  The remaining roles were pre existing roles that were occupied by employees who had scored higher than the Claimant during a redundancy exercise and therefore the obligation to “slot” an employee on maternity leave into the suitable alternative vacancy did not arise. There is no way that MAPLE could therefore circumvent a normal redundancy situation / a normal objective selection process.   Regulation 10 did not bite unless there was other suitable alternative employment available as part of the redundancy exercise.

Comment

The case is a reminder of the correct application of the law in this area and that, although Regulation 10 of MAPLE is a difficult area of law for employers, its protection is not as wide as to give an employee on maternity leave preference over other candidates in the same role where those roles are being made redundant.