“No Jab – No Job”…. A good idea?
By Níamh Kelly
2021-02-08
The well-publicised roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines is gathering pace… so it might mean we’re rounding the corner after almost a year of pandemic. While it is initially reserved for the high-risk categories and frontline health and care workers, it will not be long before millions of other people of working age are invited for a jab. It raises key questions for employers regarding their stance on the vaccine.
With the announcement of a ‘No Jab No Job’ policy from Charlie Mullins of Pimlico Plumbers (remember him?!), the first question on many of my clients lips was ‘When can my employees get vaccinated?’
It is probably the simplest to answer as the government has given an expected timeline of everyone aged 18 and over being offered the vaccine by the Autumn of 2021.
From there, the questions are not quite so straightforward to answer: ‘Can I ask that employees get vaccinated? What are my options if an employee refuses a vaccination?’
Whether you could ask that employees get vaccinated would really depend on if it was a reasonable request to make in the context of your business. For example – there’s an obvious difference between asking a care home worker to get vaccinated, compared to someone who works by themselves remotely… or (as in the case of many of you); works outdoors and mostly socially distanced.
Doing any more than asking (best done by a non-contractual policy which outlines the benefits of vaccination and why your business is recommending it), exposes you to a number of risks.
The employment law risks are significant. One of the protected characteristics of the Equality Act is religion or philosophical belief. A person who does not believe in vaccinations or a person whose religion bans the use of certain substances found in the vaccine may claim protection under this. In December the Vatican has said it is acceptable for Catholics to have the vaccine, but other faiths may not accept it.. (As you probably saw towards the end of January; there were several joint statements from faith leaders, politicians and celebrities around the myths that had sprung up over vaccines and whether they contained port or beef products for example).
Those who are pregnant or suffer from severe allergies would likely be prevented from having the vaccination on medical grounds and may be vulnerable to catching COVID-19 so even if everyone is vaccinated, they still might not be able to attend work. So it is a complex area.
That being said, if a company has carried out a risk assessment and the request is a reasonable way to achieve the aim of minimising the risk in the first place you could potentially dismiss. You would, however, have to ensure a dismissal process was followed properly – and taken on its own merits. Obviously looking at alternative roles or working from home before dismissal would be sensible. There is no case law to which to refer.
Other legal areas into which an employer-led vaccination initiative could stray include data protection and workplace disputes between pro- and anti-vax employees. You may have seen that a huge vaccination centre in the USA was forced to close over the weekend due to mass demonstrations from anti-vax individuals and closer to home, a vaccination centre was set on fire in Belgium….
What on the face of it may seem a reasonable health and safety precaution in embracing the vaccine is full of nuance. Education and persuasion and a thorough examination of options will generally be a better starting point than confrontation; but professional advice is essential.
So! Revisit your risk assessments to make sure you have a plan for those who are shielding and can’t get the vaccine; revisit your social media policy to ensure that you are being explicit about staff posts which may impact on your business; and finally, make sure your staff know that their personal opinion on vaccination and/or COVID stays at home (which is probably true of politics as well!)
About the author
© Níamh Kelly – Director of The HR Dept Shropshire and The HR Dept Wrexham & Chester– is an award-winning HR professional with over 25 years HR experience at a Senior level in the corporate, public and voluntary sector. Working with SMEs across the region; she and her team have rapidly developed a very strong client base of local companies. So if you have a question about Recruitment & Right to Work; to Resolving Problems; to Redundancy… they’re here to help you!