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<p>A response is provided to both 261785 and 261784 jointly, as the questions overlap.
Since 1 January 2017, HS2 Ltd has entered into 47 Settlement Agreements with employees
who no longer work for HS2 Ltd as at today’s date. Specifically, 26 of the 47 were
employees who had themselves applied to be made redundant as part of a voluntary redundancy
scheme that HS2 Limited ran in 2016. Of the remainder, 3 were with employees who were
being made redundant as part of 2 discrete organisational changes. Of the 47, 10 Settlement
Agreements have been entered into with staff who were members of HS2’s senior leadership
team or higher (7 of the 10 were part of the voluntary redundancy programme mentioned
above).</p><p> </p><p>The Settlement Agreement contains terms relating to the cessation
of the employment relationship between HS2 Ltd and the employee (e.g. termination
date, payment owed for annual leave not taken, any other payments owed, etc). There
are mutual confidentiality obligations in each Settlement Agreement but these do not
apply where information is required to be disclosed by law OR where a protected disclosure
is made by the employee under whistleblowing legislation. Of the 47 Settlement Agreements
referred to above, no employee has raised any such protected disclosure (in relation
to HS2 Ltd’s financial statements or otherwise). HS2 Ltd has not entered into any
Non-Disclosure Agreements with any HS2 employee.</p><p> </p><p>Before any Settlement
Agreement is signed by HS2 Ltd and the employee, a certificate from an independent
legal adviser must be provided, evidencing that legal advice has been given to the
employee as to the effect of the terms of the Agreement. This process can lead to
requests for changes to the template Agreement, which HS2 Ltd accepts where feasible.</p><p>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>
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