Voluntary Redundancy on maternity leave

Hi... I am currently on maternity leave and due to return to work on April 6th 2009. I work for a large company who have offered us all voluntary redundancy to be taken by the end of May. Those who remain will have to reapply for the reduced number of jobs and we have have had no clarification as to what will happen to those who are unsuccessful. However, I have been told that as I am returning from maternity leave I will automatically be allocated a role similar to the one I left and that I will not have to apply, be selected etc. Is this information correct? If this is the case will it be likely that I will be vulnerable once my 39 weeks is up (I have returned after 6 months). I am concerned that if I don't take this package now I could find myself with no job and no pay off... Many thanks for your help. Victoria

Hi Victoria

As a woman on maternity leave you are just about the most highly protected type of employee in law. The company is obliged to give you first dibs for any available roles as an alternative to redundancy, and it sounds like that is what they are doing. Once you have returned to work though, you lost that special protection so could be vulnerable in any future redundancy exercises.

If the VR package is very good and you are thinking about leaving anyway, then you will just need to decide whether or not you want to volunteer now.

Regards

Pete