There have been a lot of changes to the rights of employees of late so it is important to highlight some of the most important and perhaps less well publicised areas of law. The case of Anna Coulombeau highlighted the fact that women who choose to adopt actually have very similar rights to those who are themselves pregnant.

Anna Coulombeau was dismissed for small errors in her work that were deemed to be similar to those made by fellow male colleagues. According to Adoption UK, this is the first time in the UK that a court granted a case of unfair dismissal which is directly related to adoption leave.

Ms Coulombeau had a good track record at her job having even been recognised as the employee of the month, however, when  she started attending classes to prepare for her pending adoption she was called into disciplinary hearings. Her employers, Enterprise Rent-A-Car  cited small and genuine errors as reason for the hearings. These small errors has been made by others at the company and had not led to dismissal. Despite that fact, she was dismissed for gross misconduct and her appeal against that decision was further dismissed.

The law states that an employee qualifies for adoption leave if they have worked for the employer for 26 continuous weeks and have been matched with a suitable child to adopt. The rights are the same no matter how many hours you are employed or the level of payment you receive.  An employee will also normally be entitled to Statutory Adoption Pay for the first 39 weeks after a child is adopted. This acts as an equivalent of maternity leave. In addition, paternity leave and pay may be available to a partner.

The rules in this area do differ depending on whether the child is adopted from within the UK or from overseas and it is advisable that employers be aware of this.

What some employers may not be aware of is that whilst it is you as the employer who pays the Statutory Adoption Pay, you can reclaim all or most of it back from HMRC. Like maternity plans an employer can put in place its own additional rights for those who adopt but similarly it cannot offer less than is available from the statute.

The government's Business Link offers information for employers on how to deal with employees looking to take leave from work to adopt. The above case shows that even a well established company can make an error in this area so it pays to be aware of the rights of your employees available in this area.