Settlement Agreements and Non Disclosure Agreements

A Settlement Agreement ends an employee’s right to bring statutory claims arising out of their employment or its termination. However Settlement Agreements will frequently contain other clauses imposing restrictions with respect to confidentiality and other provisions including Non Disclosure Agreement terms (or NDA’s).

Can NDA’s be imposed which prevent employees from making whistleblowing disclosures or reporting criminal wrongdoing?. The short answer is no, they should not. This is reinforced by warnings issued by the Solicitors Regulation Authority – see NDA warning.

Most settlement agreements now contain wording along the following lines, making this clear:

Nothing in this Agreement prevents the parties from making a disclosure:

which amounts to a protected disclosure [whistleblowing disclosure] within the meaning of section 43A of the Employment Rights Act 1996;
in order to report an offence to a law enforcement agency or to co-operate with a criminal investigation or prosecution;
for the purposes of reporting misconduct, or a serious breach of regulatory requirements, to anybody responsible for supervising or regulating the matters in question; or
if and to the extent required by law.
for the purpose of taking medical advice our counselling, subject to that medical adviser or counsellor ensuring confidentiality of what is discussed

if you are offered a Settlement Agreement, we can provide expert legal advice on it. We are settlement agreement solicitors based in London and online. For further information on settlement agreements, please use the following links:

Call us today on 0207 118 0950 to speak to an Employment Solicitor.