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Founder and chairman of Pimlico Plumbers, Charlie Mullins, said: ‘When we go off to Africa and Caribbean countries, we have to have a jab for malaria – we don’t think about it, we just do it.’ Photograph: Stefan Wermuth/Reuters
Founder and chairman of Pimlico Plumbers, Charlie Mullins, said: ‘When we go off to Africa and Caribbean countries, we have to have a jab for malaria – we don’t think about it, we just do it.’ Photograph: Stefan Wermuth/Reuters

Pimlico Plumbers to introduce 'no jab, no job' work contracts

This article is more than 3 years old

Move comes amid concerns about Covid ‘anti-vaxxers’ but may have legal implications

Pimlico Plumbers will introduce a “no jab, no job” policy requiring all of its workers to be vaccinated against Covid-19.

Charlie Mullins, Pimlico’s founder and former chief executive, now chairman, said the company’s lawyers were drafting new employment contracts for its 400-strong workforce to include the vaccine requirement, although employment lawyers questioned whether it would be legally enforceable.

Governments around the world have started major programmes after regulators approved a series of vaccinations. The UK had given more than 2.6 million people the first dose of a vaccine by Tuesday.

Extensive medical trials have found that the vaccines approved by UK regulators are safe. However, there are concerns that the increase in hesitancy and so-called anti-vaxxers will lead to lower vaccination rates, risking further coronavirus outbreaks and potentially endangering the lives of others.

Charlie Mullins.

“No vaccine, no job,” Mullins said in an interview with City A.M. “When we go off to Africa and Caribbean countries, we have to have a jab for malaria – we don’t think about it, we just do it. So why would we accept something within our country that’s going to kill us when we can have a vaccine to stop it?”

Some tropical countries require travellers to have inoculations against diseases such as yellow fever. There is no malaria vaccine, but antimalarial treatments – typically delivered in pill form – are also commonplace.

However, employment lawyers said attempts by companies to force employees to be vaccinated could lead to claims of discrimination or constructive dismissal, potentially opening employers up to expensive compensation claims. Not even the UK government has the power to force citizens to be vaccinated.

Nick Wilcox, a partner at BDBF, a London-based law firm, said employers would have to balance their duty of care for employees during the pandemic against their duty not to undermine employees’ trust or confidence in employers.

He said mandatory vaccinations “could be an issue”, particularly if an employee has a religious or philosophical belief that they should not receive a vaccine. Wilcox advised that employers should seek to consult employees about vaccinations rather than trying to impose them.

Other businesses have backed the vaccines. Unilever’s chief executive, Alan Jope, said on Wednesday that the company would strongly encourage all of its workers to have the vaccine, but said the FTSE 100 firm would stop short of making it mandatory.

In Australia, the Council of Small Business Organisations, a lobby group, said last summer it would back making vaccinations mandatory.

“If one of my staff members says: ‘No, I’m against it’, then I’m going to have to say: ‘I’m sorry you are a threat to my business’,” its chief executive, Peter Strong, told Australia’s 7News.

“If you don’t sack them, you don’t have a business, especially if you’re in a high-contact area where you’ve got a lot of customers.”

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