Every day this week brought more miserable news of escalating job losses and rapidly rising unemployment, topped off by an unremittingly bleak outlook for the economy in the Bank of England's inflation report on Wednesday.

Evidence from XpertHR website usage reports and our legal advice service for employers confirms that many of our customers' organisations are being buffeted by the downturn. Articles and resources on redundancy are now among the most popular on the site and around 70% of calls and emails to our legal advice line are redundancy-related.

With this in mind, our legal team have this week pulled together an XpertHR redundancy resources page, gathering together links to the key redundancy-related resources on the service under main headings.

Issues covered include alternatives to redundancy, legal compliance, redundancy and pregnancy/maternity leave, voluntary redundancy and managing redundancy survivors.

The legal compliance section has links to our resources covering all aspects of the law on redundancy rights, including lay-off and short-time working, and to model policies, documents, letters and forms that can help you create legally compliant documentation for your organisation.

It also includes links to our statutory redundancy payments worked examples, which guide you through the process of calculating statutory redundancy payments. And in view of the fact that the law on redundancy develops in the courts, it features links to recent key cases with practical implications for HR and employers.

David Shepherd, Editor

Research request

Research request: stress management
IRS is conducting a survey investigating what employers are doing about the challenge of managing stress, highlighting the stress-management measures that are proving particularly effective. Please take a few minutes to take part.

Employment law

Topic of the week: Redundancy and the alternatives
In this week's topic of the week article, Sue Nickson of Hammonds LLP looks at a number of alternatives to redundancy. In addition, we pull together some of the wealth of information on XpertHR on redundancy and related topics.

BERR approves revised Acas discipline and grievance code of practice
The Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform has approved the revised Acas code of practice on disciplinary and grievance procedures.

How to use flexible working to avoid redundancies
Agreeing flexible working arrangements such as reduced hours, job sharing and term-time working with staff, can be a way of avoiding redundancies. Blair Adams and Caroline Stakim at Shepherd and Wedderburn examine the issues.

Promoting positive action as part of the Equality Bill
Despite plenty of negative publicity, the use of positive action will be extended when the Equality Bill becomes law. Personnel Today looks for the plus points of this.

New model documents on shift swapping
XpertHR's policies and documents service has been enhanced by the addition of a model shift-swap policy and a shift-swap agreement form.

Legal Q&A: Second incomes
Guy Guinan, employment partner, Halliwells, answers queries on the potential pitfalls of having a second income.

Weekly dilemma: Pay by commission and the minimum wage
Jane Moorman, partner, and Melanie Smith, solicitor, both at Howard Kennedy, consider the options available to employers who want to switch staff to commission-only salaries.

Latest case reports added to XpertHR
We provide a round-up of case reports added to XpertHR this week, covering age discrimination in redundancy schemes.

Case reports stop press
XpertHR's case law stop press service highlights recent key cases including the Employment Appeal Tribunal decision in European Credit Management Ltd v Hosso that an employee who raised a grievance about her "pay" did not satisfy step one of the modified grievance procedure in relation to a complaint about her level of bonus payment.

HR strategy and policy

Flexible working looks set to increase
Flexible working is making a comeback, driven by the impending recession and government enthusiasm for the concept.

Managing redundancies effectively
Personnel Today looks at the steps to take when seeking to maintain business performance during a period of job cuts.

Health and safety

Redefining the length of sickness absence
Redefining the length of time employees are off work sick is at the heart of new thinking on absence.

Recognising and supporting staff with mental ill health
How an Australian pilot programme can help UK managers to recognise and support staff who are suffering from mental ill health.

Training and development

OH practice: Mentoring
Occupational Health looks at the benefits to be gained from mentoring.

International

EU: Commission proposes new maternity leave rules
In October 2008, the European Commission proposed changes to the maternity leave provisions of the 1992 EU Directive on pregnant workers. The minimum period of maternity leave would be increased from 14 weeks to 18 weeks and women on maternity leave would receive full pay, though member states could subject this to a ceiling, no lower than the rate of sick pay.

Latest developments from across Europe
International specialists at IRS round up employment developments from across Europe, including: European Commission proposals to increase maternity leave rights across the EU; Europe-wide agreements on the employment of older and disabled workers at French retailer PPR; and the opening shots in the 2008 negotiations in German metalworking, probably Europe's most important bargaining round.

Employment intelligence: from the blog

Will unemployment top two million by Christmas?
The UK unemployment level has once again risen sharply, hitting 1.82 million in the three months to September 2008, according to latest official figures. The unemployment rate rose to 5.8% over this period, up from 5.4% for the preceding rolling quarter.

Bank of England Inflation Report points to further interest rate cuts
Following last week's surprise 1.5 percentage point cut in interest rates, the Bank of England has hinted at further cuts over the coming months, in its November 2008 Inflation Report.

How big is your gender pay gap?
How much of a gender pay gap is there in your organisation? Assuming there is some sort of pay differential between men and women in your employ (and few organisations can say otherwise), are you more or less of an equal opportunities employer than other companies?

Model policy on shift swapping
A common way for employers to give employees some flexibility in their working hours is to allow them to swap shifts with colleagues. Use XpertHR's new model shift-swap policy to see how it can be done.

Welsh speaking employee wins race discrimination claim
A worker who was denied the right to speak Welsh at a disciplinary hearing has won her claim for race discrimination.

Private sector pay 2007/08: Utilities workers top pay league table
Workers in the utilities sector have received higher pay rises than those in any other industry this year, according to a major review of private sector reward trends from IRS.

News from XpertHR

Coming soon to XpertHR
Forthcoming additions to XpertHR include a topic of the week series on dealing with potential workplace issues over the Christmas period, and a model change management policy.

Latest additions to XpertHR services
A number of enhancements have been made to XpertHR's case reports stop press, policies and documents and frequently asked questions services.

Save £50 on managing successful TUPE staff transfers masterclass
XpertHR subscribers are entitled to a £50 discount per delegate on IRS's managing successful TUPE staff transfers masterclass.