Recruitment firms will welcome a High Court ruling limiting their obligations on Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) for temporary staff.

Cas Thompson, accounts and administration manager for Thorn Baker, told Recruiter the ruling had "major implications" for temporary recruitment firms.

Under a new law created by the ruling, agency workers will only be eligible to be paid SSP after starting an assignment contracted to last at least three months, or by working continuously on various assignments for a period of three months for their agency.

The case, which has been running for three years, involved two temporary agency workers who had claimed SSP from the firm despite working less than three months.

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) argued the two workers involved were entitled to SSP under the Fixed Term Employees Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment Regulation 2002, an amendment to the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992.

However, Thorn Baker said that because the pair had worked for less than three months, the firm was covered by an exemption of the Act: namely, one that specifies the regulations do not affect employment when it is under a fixed-term contract and the employee is an agency worker.

Thorn Baker won the initial verdict last year, but HMRC appealed and the case was taken to the High Court.

Thompson said: "We have 1,500 temporary staff contracted out to clients each week but only a handful are deemed to be long-term workers, who have worked with us for more than three months. This small group are the only ones entitled to SSP along with maternity and paternity pay, and not all our temporary workers, as we have succeeded in proving."