Ford v Warwickshire CC [1983] 2 AC 71 is a UK labour law case, concerning unfair dismissal, governed by the Employment Rights Act 1996.

She sought to claim her dismissal was unfair, but was told that her year long fixed term contract was not enough to meet the necessary qualifying period.

The House of Lords unanimously held that Mrs Ford was continuously employed, and the summer breaks were merely temporary cessations of an ongoing contract, despite being drafted as fixed terms.

[1] Suppose that in August 1977 the appellant was engaged under a contract of employment of indefinite duration, starting in September 1977, subject to one week's notice on either side.

If paragraph 9 (1) (b) is intended to apply to a case where notice of dismissal is served during the currency of the contract on account of an anticipated cessation of work, I can see no logical reason why it should be supposed not to apply where the contract itself indicates when the employment is to cease, if that is on account of the anticipated cessation of work.

If it is irrelevant to the employee's right to *90 claim on the ground of unfair dismissal, or to claim a redundancy payment, whether the employee's work has ended owing to the expiry of the fixed term of the contract or owing to the expiry of the term of the notice of dismissal, it seems to me entirely consistent that the "counting" process under paragraph 9 (1) (b) should likewise have no regard to the question whether the "absence from work" was the immediate result of the dismissal notice, or the immediate result of the expiry of a fixed term specified in the contract.