Ruling implies that additional protections will be afforded to members of LLPs.

The UK Supreme Court recently ruled that members of a limited liability partnership (an LLP) are workers for the purpose of protections for whistleblowing. As the definition of “worker” used in the statute concerned is identical or very similar to that used in various other pieces of legislation, this decision means that the protection afforded to members of an LLP is wider than had previously been understood. In particular:

• The decision means that members of an LLP are potentially caught by minimum wage legislation (although this is not likely to be an issue in most cases).

• LLPs should consider whether the employer duties under the automatic enrolment legislation apply to their members. If so, and if the members meet the statutory conditions (including if they earn sufficient “qualifying earnings”), they would need to be automatically enrolled into a qualifying pension plan by the LLP.