Sarah Williams

Sarah has a wide range of employment experience having originally trained and worked as a nurse before studying law. From a very early stage in her legal career, Sarah has been interested in employment law, particularly industrial and trade union law. Sarah completed her solicitor’s training at the UK’s largest trade union law firm, eventually becoming a Partner in a different leading trade union law firm. She has the relatively rare professional experience of ‘both sides’ of the industrial relations equation, both management and trade union. That gives her an excellent foundation to provide well informed, pragmatic strategic advice, in the most challenging of situations.

Throughout the course of her career, Sarah has worked on high profile and legally reported cases with leading Counsel, which have attracted national media attention on various issues including industrial action. Sarah is often asked to provide advice about industrial relations, working with trade unions, the structure of trade unions, and how they operate, which all helps to support management approach. She also provides advice about union recognition, derecognition and referrals to the Central Arbitration Committee and regularly provides advice about trade disputes and ballots for industrial action.

Sarah has been a solicitor for over 20 years and obtained commercial experience during her first period of employment at Weightmans between 2002 and 2007. Sarah eventually “settled” on the commercial side and having returned to Weightmans, she provides regular employment and HR advice to various organisations about all areas of employment law including disciplinary and grievance issues, TUPE, reward, redundancy, and reorganisation issues and defending Employment Tribunal claims.

Sarah enjoys the diverse range of work that employment law offers, and most of all she enjoys meeting people, working as part of a team, and helping business managers and leaders.

Notable cases

During her career, Sarah has worked with senior union lawyers and Queen’s Counsel, assisting on the following reported cases:

• MSF Union v Refuge Assurance PLC & ANOR 2002 ICR 1365, about the definition of “establishment”, to which redundant workers are assigned.
• Metrobus Ltd v Unite the Union [2009]EWCA Civ 829 CA, about fatal defects in a ballot for industrial action.
• British Airways Industrial Action 2010, Cabin Crew, a widely reported trade dispute involving 12,000 members who balloted for 3 day industrial action, grounding 80 planes.
• Port of Milford Haven – High Court Injunction 2010, Nationally reported case about the ballot for industrial action at one of Britain’s busiest Ports.
• Gill Martin v GMB Union, Sarah helped the GMB union defend a high profile claim which involved two former leaders of the union and senior officers in every region. The case was widely reported nationally and received centre page attention in some of the national press including the Daily Express 5 November 2010.