‘As Britain gears up to go back to work the issue of whether employees can refuse to carry out certain tasks (or to work at all) will come to the fore as it has in other countries where the lock down has been lifted. The unions are already making it an issue. Clearly people will say I will not work without appropriate social or physical distancing. They may also argue that they are not willing to work without personal protection equipment. Or that they do not want to go to work on public transport. There is likely to be a great deal of litigation and some hard cases to be decided. So how does the law strike the necessary balance? This is not something that happened much in pre covid life but there are some precedents.’
Littleton Chambers, 11th May 2020
Source: littletonchambers.com
