By Channel 4 News
As redundancies rise, Channel 4 News has discovered the number of employment tribunals citing a lack of consultation has grown.
Employers have a legal obligation to consult with their employees before making them redundant but administrators insist the law backs business that need to take swift action without consulting staff.
We have spoken to former employees at the Nortel telecommunications company, who were made redundant earlier this year.
They claim joint administrators from Ernst & Young ignored the law on consultation.
Nortel went into administration in January and two months later, more than 200 staff in Belfast and Maidenhead were told they were being made redundant without a consultation period.
In response, the administrators say they acted lawfully. They said they acted "in accordance with their duties in a way that is entirely usual when a company is in administration".
The law requires businesses to consult with the affected employees, then avoid, reduce and mitigate the impact of redundancies.
Ernst & Young insist they did not have time to consult with the employees because Nortel was facing serious financial difficulties.
In a statement, they wrote: "No consultation took place as it was not reasonably practicable to do so; employment legislation recognises that there are situations in which swift action needs to be taken."
Employers can claim an exemption from consulting with their employees in situations that are sudden or unexpected.
Maidenhead MP Theresa May, the shadow secretary of state for work and pensions, attended a meeting with Ernst & Young along some of the redundant employees.
She said: "What was of most conern in our discussion with Ernst & Young was a clear indication that they would be very happy to use this strategy again in the future.
"They showed no remorse about having used this approach and I feel the employees have been treated extremely badly."
The Tribunals Service has shown that wider complaints about employers failing to consult have risen 250 per cent from 4,480 in 2007/8 to 11,371 this year.
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