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06th September 2010

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Jonathan Ross and Haringey Council – ‘A mad world my masters’

In the last fortnight, a BBC presenter has been suspended for three months without pay for bad taste humour which was sanctioned by his senior manager and several social workers in a London Borough have received ‘written warnings’ for their parts in the systematic torture and subsequent murder of a child by three people when the child was under their supervision.

Given comments from Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, there may well be further employment law repercussions for the individuals involved in Haringey but as a first response from the employers in both instances the inconsistencies are obvious. In the Jonathan Ross case, the overwhelming response of younger people was that his punishment did not fit whatever crime he may have been guilty of and there is certainly an employment law argument which would view the disciplinary action as extreme in the circumstances. In the case of Haringey, it is hard to imagine that the employer’s current response is remotely adequate. Ultimately in both cases the effect of public and press opinion may well be the thing which is driving weak employers when they should be taking a moral position of their own for the benefit of their standing and reputation particularly with their staff and customers.

Whatever madness might attach to the contrast between the two decisions is only enhanced by learning that Haringey Council received favourable coverage in the CIPD journal as recently as August this year for a Human Capital Measurement system which Steve Davies, Head of HR, described as helping the organisation to be efficient and helping line managers to keep HR issues at the top of their agenda. At the risk of sounding like a teenager, what planet are these people on?      

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