Tribunal Monkey

For how long can employers stop ex-employees joining rivals?

Around the time as the Government was proposing limiting non-competition restrictions in employment contracts to three months, the head of the civil service tried to block Sue Gray from joining Labour as Kier Starmer’s chief of staff for two years. Some commentators referred to this as two years’ “garden leave”, which brought to mind my own experience of litigating how long Formula One teams could hold employees to lengthy fixed-term contracts. What is going on and how long can employers keep employees away from their rivals?