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The Howard Shuttering Contractors case throws considerable light on the importance which the tribunals attach to warnings before dismissing an employee. In this case the tribunal took great pains to interpret the intention of the parties to the different site agreements, and it came to the conclusion that the agreed procedure was not followed. One other matter, which must be particularly noted by employers, is that where a final warning is required, this final warning must be “a warning”, and not the actual dismissal. So that where, for example, three warnings are to be given, the third must be a “warning”. It is after the employee has misconducted himself thereafter that the employer may dismiss.

The objectives of this paper are twofold. Firstly, to examine the importance of Malaysian public procurement objectives and secondly, to investigate the extent to which government suppliers adhere to public procurement principles.

For achieving the objectives, a questionnaire survey was used. A total of 250 questionnaires were distributed to government suppliers involved in the government tendering process. In return, a total of 107 useable questionnaires were received, representing a response rate of 42.8%. Descriptive statistics of the means score, standard deviation and mean score ranking were used to analyse the data.

The results revealed that the most important public procurement objective is “to ensure a continuous supply of material and services to meet the government needs from the best and reliable sources”. On the other hand, the objectives “to expand the local industrial sector by means of transfer of technology and expertise to suit the nation's needs” and “to promote alternative and multiple sourcing through supplier development according to the aspirations and vision of the government” are perceived as not important by the government suppliers. The findings also discovered a moderate level of adherence to Malaysia's public procurement principles, which consist of public accountability, transparency, open and fair competition, fair dealing and value for money. Amongst these principles, the most adhered to is the open and fair competition principle and the least adhered to is the transparency principle.

This study is one of the few studies that assess the government suppliers' perceptions of public procurement in Malaysia. More importantly, this study may give some ideas to various parties concerning the areas in which improvement is required to ensure that equal importance is given to the public procurement objectives and better adherence to the public procurement principles in Malaysia.

This paper aims to determine the influence of travel fair selection factors on exhibitor intention to attend, in conjunction with the role of political risk within that relationship.

Following the basic premises of image repair theory, this quantitative study examines the perceptions of 205 exhibitors – both domestic and international – at Belgrade Travel Fair.

Two variables – travel fair customer acquisition and retention orientation and market orientation – were found to influence travel fair intention in a statistically significant manner, while multi-group structural equation modeling indicates a positive statistically significant correlation between travel fair customer acquisition and retention and travel fair market orientation and travel fair intention for exhibitors that place higher importance on political risk in the region.

The limitations of the research are its regional focus and its small sample size.

Travel fair organizers should consider market orientation and customer acquisition and retention orientation as important antecedents of travel fair intention. Exhibitor perception of political risk enhances image repair efforts.

The study focuses on the perception of travel fair exhibitors when attending a travel fair in a region which is continually exposed to political risk. Thus, travel fairs can act as image repair instruments for companies affected by political risk in a region, as they have the capacity to present a positive image to a specific audience.

The study enhances the existing work related to image repair theory by observing how travel fairs can be used as image repair instruments. The originality of the study lies in its provision of further understanding of the reasons for exhibitor attendance at travel fairs and, more specifically, the role of political risk in this context. The study’s findings extend the applicability of the image repair theory in the context of the behavioral nature of travel fair attendance.

Vertical trading relations between retailers and their suppliers are an important determinant of competition, strategy and performance in a number of sectors in the economy, and thus strongly influence consumer welfare. The balance of vertical power between retailers and manufacturers has changed over the past 20 or 30 years to confer more influence on retailers, and this has had a number of obvious outcomes in terms of retailer influence on product design and advertising, including own‐label goods. Other changes, such as increasingly beneficial terms of trade for large‐scale retailers in some sectors and the deterioration in manufacturer profitability, have led to government enquiry into particular sectors, and demands from some parties for a legislative response to perceived problems. The article suggests that while there is room for improvement in UK retailing performance, the outcomes for consumer welfare of changes in the vertical balance of power in markets are more difficult to assess.

In the discussion groups subjects will be taken up which are not dealt with in the lectures. The subjects to be taken up in the discussion groups of each week and the assignments relating thereto will be announced well in advance of the meetings.

European air transport policy, emerged through the confluence of case law and legislation, in four broad areas: liberalization, safety and security, greening, and the external policy. Following the implementation of the single market for air transport, policy shifted to liberalizing and regulating associated services and in recent years to greening, the external aviation policy, and safety and security. Inclusion of air transport in the Environmental Trading Scheme of the European Union exemplifies the European Commission’s proactive stand on bringing the industry in line with emission reduction trajectories of other industries. However, the bid to include flights to third countries in the trading scheme pushed the EU into a controversial position, causing the Commission to halt implementation and to give ICAO time to seek a global multilateral agreement. The chapter also discusses how the nationality clauses in air services agreements breached the Treaty of Rome, and a court ruling to that effect enabled the EC to extend EU liberalization policies beyond the European Union, resulting in the Common Aviation Area with EU fringe countries and the Open Aviation Area with the USA. Another important area of progress was aviation safety, where the EU region is unsurpassed in the world, yet the Commission has pushed the boundary even further, by establishing the European Safety Agency to oversee the European Aviation Safety Management System. Another important area of regulatory development was aviation security, a major focus after the woeful events in 2001, but increasingly under industry scrutiny on costs and effectiveness. The chapter concludes by arguing that in the coming decade, the EU will strive to strengthen its position as a global countervailing power, symbolized in air transport by a leadership position in environmental policy and international market liberalization, exemplified in the EU’s external aviation policy.

The aim of this chapter is to examine and challenge the fairness rhetoric used by many US lawmakers to prevent trans girls and women from participating in school sports. Legislators embrace faulty scientific claims to assert unfairness based on physiology and many sport philosophers work from the premise that the first priority of sport is to be competitively fair. We argue that this is a misguided notion and that sport must be just before it can be fair. Using Iris Marion Young's framework of justice, we contend that excluding trans athletes from school sport is an injustice. We propose that focusing on the eradication of injustice is the ethical path forward for the inclusion and full participation of trans people in sport.

The purpose of this paper is to argue that insight into internet topology at various levels of aggregation is necessary for identifying and understanding policy issues in the areas of fair competition, reliability and performance in the internet.

Using three areas of social concern in relation to the global information infrastructure as a context, the paper provides some theoretical examples, supported by case examples, which show the importance of gaining insight into internet topology.

The paper finds that proper detectors for internet policy are lacking and insight into the topology of the internet is needed. The only feasible way of obtaining this insight is by topology measurements, but still some fundamental pathologies in the available measurement tools and techniques need to be overcome. All internet topologies published to date suffer from these limitations and their use for identifying internet policy is limited.

The paper provides a general overview of importance and limitations. Future research should be focused on increasing the usability of internet topology by solving fundamental issues in the area of internet topology measurement.

The availability of high‐quality internet topology maps at various levels of aggregation would dramatically improve one's ability to identify and understand certain policy issues in the internet.

In policy analysis it is often ignored that certain policy issues have their base in the internet infrastructure and knowledge of this infrastructure is limited. In internet topology research, focus is mainly on technical and operational issues and limited attention is given to the usability of inferred topology for identifying policy issues. Until now, an approach that addresses both fundamental topology research and internet policy issues in concordance has been lacking.

The ability of construction firms to become more environmentally conscious and socially responsible for their business activities has been touted as the key driver for improved individual firms' competitiveness. This study explores the key dimensions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices and their impact factors among construction firms.

Through the institutional, stakeholders and self-determination theories, this study proposed a conceptual framework of CSR implementation. For its validation, data were collected from 90 top-tier construction firms using an online survey and analyzed via a two-pronged factor analysis method.

The empirical results demonstrate that the CSR practices of construction firms include eight key dimensions, e.g. shareholders' interests, government commitment and CSR institutional arrangement. The three key groups of impact factor of CSR implementation are (1) identified factors (i.e. contractors' perceived importance of CSR practices); (2) external institutional factors (i.e. coercive and normative factors and mimetic factors); and (3) intrinsic factors (i.e. strategic business direction, resource and capability and organizational culture).

The research findings inform the practitioners about how to enact, manage and improve firms' socially responsible goals so as to fulfill their key stakeholders' requirements and expectations and thus enhance their legitimacy in construction businesses.

This study contributes to CSR knowledge by identifying and empirically demonstrating valid measurements of the key dimensions of practices and impact factors toward CSR implementation by construction firms.

This study aimed to determine the relationship between the concept of competitive advantage and the value of Catur Paramitha on small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Sarbagita.

The design of this research used a qualitative approach based on the grounded theory with explorative and phenomenological approaches.

The relationship of the concept of competitive advantage orientation and the value of Catur Paramitha on SMEs in Sarbagita forms the characters SMEs’ business actors, namely, first, fair competition without hurting or harming others can be avoided. Second, the emergence of business cooperation with various business characters can form a wise entrepreneurial spirit. Third, making the entrepreneur more professional in managing the business. Fourth, forming a happy attitude to help others, making cooperation.

The integration of applied values of local wisdom on the concept of competitive advantage orientation in building business in SME sector in Bali as a guideline for managers and lead the business.

The originality of this research was conceptually, building the concept of competitive advantage with local wisdom in developed countries has done by many. However, the local wisdom in developed countries is very different from the local wisdom in Indonesia, especially in Bali. Not all the main characteristics of the basic concept of cultural values in developed countries are applicable and in accordance with local conditions and cultures in the context of country. In addition, the concept of competitive advantage in developed countries is often assumed to operate in a stable and predictable business environment.