Melvyn Harris

In acting on all aspects of employment law, examples of Melvyn’s recent successes include:

• Succeeding for an employee of a substantial multi-national who had issued a claim of unfair dismissal and age discrimination over 13 months after the primary time limit to bring the claims had expired. Melvyn obtained a decision that it had not been reasonably practicable for the employee to have brought his unfair dismissal claim in time and that the claim was issued within a reasonable period. He also obtained a decision that it was just and equitable to extend time for the age discrimination claim. The matter will now go to a trial of both claims.
• Resisting claims by a Care Home Manager for overtime, holiday pay based on overtime pay, and bonus pay against a care homes group.
• Representing a claimant in an automatically unfair dismissal for making protected disclosures, instructed by Paul Whitfield of Fox Whitfield
• Representing a store manager in an unfair dismissal claim against a major supermarket group who had been dismissed for alleged gross misconduct.
• Obtaining a six figure sum for a senior executive at a mediation relating to a claim under the employer’s incentive scheme. This represented over 80% of the sum he had been claiming.
• Resisting an injunction application against two ex-directors who had left and started their own business that was competing with the company with whom they had previously been employed.
• Resisting a claim for unfair dismissal and sex and race discrimination by a senior employee of a Housing Association who was represented by an important member of her trade union.
• Resisting a claim for constructive unfair dismissal and sex discrimination by an employee of a retail group who resigned over the way she had been treated by her male line manager.
• Obtaining a finding of unfair dismissal for an employee of a leading golf club who had been dismissed for gross misconduct.

Gill Brown, Legal Director of Phillips Solicitors, wrote to Melvyn’s clerk in September 2024:

“Please thank Melvyn for a challenging job well done and a great outcome”.

In September 2022 the Head of Group Business Affairs for whom Melvyn acted under Direct Access in agreeing terms with an employee to leave wrote:

“Just want to say it was a pleasure to work with you and thank you for your effort and support. If [the employee] had hired you instead of us, it all could have gone a different way for [us].”

David Williams of D C Kaye & Co Solicitors wrote to Melvyn on 9 June 2020 when talking about working with him for 11 years:

“I must say that the most rewarding experiences of my legal practice in all of that time have come from working with you on cases and I am and always will remain profoundly grateful to you for that.”

Caroline Walker of Cavendish Employment Law, award-winning employment lawyers for the City, wrote to Melvyn in July 2019:

“I very much like the way you work and how promptly and thoroughly you attend to matters”.