HR help sought

Any HR / employment law experts out there who could help me out? Asking for a friend… (please excuse the very long post, it’s a complicated situation to explain).

My friend (let’s say “G”) works for an organisation which is going through a bit of self-inflicted upheaval. They have decided that they need to restructure. Due to the way that it is being managed around 40% of the workforce have been placed “at risk of redundancy”, although the stated number of unfilled roles in the new structure is more than the number of employees at risk. Some vacancies have been ring-fenced, open only to specific at-risk employees.  Expressions of interest in any of the other vacancies are being sought, as are applications for voluntary severence.

G has two part-time contracts with this organisation, in different departments. One is a permanent zero-hours contract, which started in January 2020. In spite of being zero-hours, this has amounted to being a 0.5 role week-in week-out for its entire duration (apart from the occasional week’s leave).

The other contract is part-time (0.5FTE), fixed term. This started in February 2022 as a 6-month contract and has since been renewed 4 times, with no break in service. G’s current contract ends at the end of January 2025. The continuous service date on this contract is stated as their start date at the organisation – i.e. January 2020.

Due to the nature of G’s contracts, they have not been put at risk on either of them (presumably with the internal expectation that the zero-hours contract might be reduced and the fixed term contract not renewed). G received 2 letters about the restructure, one in relation to each contract, so it seems the employer is treating them as separate.

G has a couple of questions:
1.        Should G be placed “at risk” / eligible for redundancy against their FT contract, given that it has been renewed multiple times over 2+ years (their current contract ends 3 years after the start of the first one)? Faced with the likely non-renewal of the temporary contract a redundancy settlement looks more appealing. In fact a supplementary question would be: Has G gained any additional employment rights owing to the multiple renewals which would prevent the contract being unrenewed at its end date?
2.        If G’s temporary contract was determined to be at risk, could the employer decide that the permanent, zero hours contract is also at risk? I should add that in this role G works in a team of similarly contracted colleagues, all of whom have been notified that they are unaffected by the restructure.

Again, apologies for the lengthy post. Any pointers gratefully received.