Mr C Butler v CareTech Community Services Limited — 2022

The claimant, a support worker, had not worked or been paid wages or holiday pay after 8 September 2021. The dispute was whether wages were properly payable during that period. The tribunal found that the respondent required staff in its care services to wear masks, that the claimant had been instructed to do so, and that the claimant understood he could work if he wore a mask.

The tribunal found that the claimant was not suspended. It accepted the respondent's evidence that work remained available if the claimant complied with the mask requirement, and rejected the claimant's account that he was prevented from working by suspension. The tribunal found that wearing a mask was an objectively reasonable management instruction and that the claimant was not ready, willing and able to work because he had chosen not to comply with that instruction.

On holiday pay, the tribunal found that the claimant had not requested to carry forward annual leave from 2021 to 2022 and had not shown that it was not reasonably practicable to take leave in 2021. It also found that, because the claimant remained employed, he remained entitled to take paid annual leave in 2022 but was not entitled to accrued holiday pay as if employment had ended.