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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.

A distinction must be drawn between a dismissal on the one hand, and on the other a repudiation of a contract of employment as a result of a breach of a fundamental term of that contract. When such a repudiation has been accepted by the innocent party then a termination of employment takes place. Such termination does not constitute dismissal (see London v. James Laidlaw & Sons Ltd (1974) IRLR 136 and Gannon v. J. C. Firth (1976) IRLR 415 EAT).

Knight's Industrial Law Reports goes into a new style and format as Managerial Law This issue of KILR is restyled Managerial Law and it now appears on a continuous updating basis rather than as a monthly routine affair.

The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

Ever since the formation of the voluntary Consumers' Association in the late 1950s this country has been concerned with making sure that the consumer has a fair deal. Recently the Office of Fair Trading was set up which, amongst other things, provides for customers information and advice on the rights and responsibilities of retailers. In this special feature Gordon Borrie, Director General of Fair Trading, is interviewed by Ann Foster, consultant to the National Consumer Council.

It is undoubtedly the case that advertising plays a significant part in modern economic life in most societies and many view it as an essential part of the operation of a free market system. Yet it is also the case that our knowledge of how exactly it works and whether the vast amounts spent on it are justified is still uncertain. Lord Leverhulme, the founder of Lever Brothers, is credited with the famous aphorism — ‘one half of advertising does not work but nobody knows which half’ and that perhaps sums up the situation very well. One thing that is generally accepted is that some protection must be provided both to consumers and trade competitors from false or misleading advertising which can lead to market distortions and economic loss to purchasers. Increasingly controversial, however, is the scope and extent of legal and voluntary controls on advertising. In the advertising industry fears are rising about the volume of both national and EEC proposals to restrict or limit advertising and as we move from the '80s, a decade of conspicuous consumption in which advertising flourished, to the caring '90s where environmental issues are to the fore, the advertising industry faces major challenges. Advertising as a whole is facing severe economic and legal challenges after the massive expansion of the 1980's — it is estimated that there was a 4% fall in real terms in UK advertising expenditure in the first quarter of 1990 and an estimated 5% fall in the second quarter. Clients are becoming more demanding and the cosy cartel arrangement whereby advertising agencies made a 15% standard commission on a client's expenditure has gone — commissions are down to 12%‐13% or being replaced by fixed fees. It has been estimated by the Advertising Association that proposed legal restrictions could lead to a loss of £1 bn in revenue for the industry. Multi‐farious pressure groups are campaigning against drink advertising, cigarette advertising and sexism in adverts. The advertising industry's concerns are reflected in a recent report by the Advertising Association — ‘A Freedom Under Threat — Advertising in the EC’. The report indicates a number of areas where legislative controls have been introduced or are proposed to be introduced over the next few years and expresses the fear that controls may be going too far in limiting freedom of ‘commercial speech’. Martin Boase, chairman of the Advertising Association writes in his introduction to the report:

Claims use of legislation and government regulations as a means of protecting consumers has been subject to considerable controversy in many countries over recent years. Examines the UK's efforts to encourage voluntary self‐regulation by business — the most important manifestation of this has been the adoption of codes of practice in numerous trades — a code of practice being a statement of desirable trading practices. Says that data for analysis here is based on monitoring studies and other reports produced by the Office of Fair Trading and Consumers' Association and also direct interviews with trade associations and companies, supplemented by a postal questionnaire survey. Further discusses the rationale and lists and examines the most likely criteria to be used. Concludes that, overall, codes of practice are likely to have been beneficial, this does not necessarily imply that they are the best means of attaining the consumer policy objectives they embody.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the competition in the UK construction industry and the key sectors that supply it, thereby identifying the degree of industrial concentration affecting the construction product.

The research is based on Official Statistics giving details of the concentration ratios of 127 industrial sectors in the UK. The quantitative information on concentration is backed up by qualitative data from reports by the Competition Commission and its predecessors plus enquiries from the Office of Fair Trading. This is used to grade each industry and weight the key inputs by their relative importance to obtain an overall picture of competition in construction.

The paper concludes that construction is one of the most competitive sectors in the economy and its input structure is also amongst the least concentrated. This is measured by taking the industrial sectors that supply construction and weighting them in terms of their contribution.

The data used are not totally comprehensive as certain information is withheld because of commercial confidentiality. The sectors concerned, including banking and real estate, might warrant further investigation.

The implications are that construction remains a highly competitive sector and there is little to be gained by regulation other than the work currently being undertaken on collusion in bidding, and on mergers and acquisitions. The key point is to ensure that competitive bidding is free from collusion.

The paper goes beyond most of the existing research in challenging the conventional view that construction has a highly concentrated input structure.

At the passing of the Fair Trading Act, 1973, and the setting up of a Consumer Protection Service with an Office of Fair Trading under a Director‐General, few could have visualized this comprehensive machinery devised to protect the mainly economic interests of consumers could be used to further the efforts of local enforcement officers and authorities in the field of purity and quality control of food and of food hygiene in particular. This, however, is precisely the effect of a recent initiative under Sect. 34 of the Act, reported elsewhere in the BFJ, taken by the Director‐General in securing from a company operating a large group of restaurants a written undertaking, as prescribed by the Section, that it would improve its standards of hygiene; the company had ten convictions for hygiene contraventions over a period of six years.