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BIS Publishes Guidance on Annual Leave and Sick Leave

Issue 34 - February 2010

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The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) has published guidance on the interaction of sick leave and paid annual leave following the European Court of Justice (ECJ) decisions in the Stringer and Pereda cases. These cases make it clear that:

• statutory holiday continues to accrue during sick leave; and
• workers can take their statutory holiday during sick leave but if they choose not to, they must be allowed to take it a later date, including in the following leave year.

 The guidance is relatively basic but it does contain an interesting point; BIS will be consulting on possible amendments to the Working Time Regulations in light of these cases, presumably because the Working Time Regulations do not currently permit the four week's basic statutory holiday to be carried over into a subsequent leave year.