Dismissal: Termination by mutual agreement

In Birch and Humber v University of Liverpool Court of Appeal 23.1.85 the Court of Appeal upholds a tribunal's finding that the termination of employment which resulted from the employees' offer to retire early and the employer's acceptance of that offer was not a dismissal but a termination by mutual agreement; so, there having been no dismissal, the employees were not entitled to a redundancy payment.

At the beginning of 1982, against a backcloth of a reduction in funds and a need to lose some 300 jobs, Liverpool University's Registrar sent all members of the University's pension fund a circular drawing their attention to a Premature Retirement Scheme.