Is it legal for a UK company - Company A - that is recruiting, to decide not to consider any applicants who have previously worked at Company B?
In the situation I am navigating, Company B has closed down after going into administration; several former employees of Company B have joined Company A; and the longstanding employees of Company A are dissenting any further recruitment of former Company B hires, regardless of their competence, and even though reinforcements are sorely needed.
My Gut says probably Legal
So, you cant discriminate on protected characteristics (Race, Religion etc.) - however a former employer is not a protected characteristics.
In Ye-Olden days, you would see a lot of soft discrimination for first jobs around High school (Public Schools > Grammar Schools > Comprehensive schools) - The argument that I heard from certain employers is that they preferred candidates from insert school because they had better experiences with them (work ethic, culture etc.)
This behaviour would very likely fall under that Umbrella - which is allowed.
However!
In reading up about this, there is one specific area, where a company is prohibited from maintaining a Blacklist - and that is where it is targeting Members who are active Union members.
If your industry is one that is heavily unionized and the people from Employer B are all in a Union, then this may be illegal - but IANAL and you would need to discuss this with someone well versed in UK employment law
If its not discriminating based on the usual suspects, such as gender, race, age etc, then why would it be illegal.
There have been cases where a company decides that another companies practices spoil the employees.
I recall a case in Taiwan where someone worked for IBM for a few years. When he left, no other company would hire him because he was corrupted by foreign work practices.
He lost his case against one company, in court.
I can't give a direct answer because I don't live in the UK and don't know UK employment law.
As others have said, the law prohibits discrimination based on "protected characteristics", like race and religion. The law doesn't prohibit a company from "discriminating" in general. We routinely expect companies to discriminate based on their appraisal of an applicant's competence, work ethic, etc. It's inevitable that there are some things that an employer would consider relevant that an applicant would not, or that one employer would consider relevant and another employer does not.
Is this the only place where you could get a job? Because if not, I'd say, just go somewhere else. Even if you could somehow force the company to hire you, why would you want to work someplace where they don't want you?
I've often heard the advice not to mention anything on my resume that directly or indirectly could indicate my race, religion, political preferences, etc. And my response is, Why not? If a company would refuse to hire me because, say, the boss doesn't approve of my religion, I doubt I'd want to work there. If I had to be careful every day to avoid mentioning anything that could reveal my religion, well that just sounds tiresome. If I was unemployed and desperate to get any job I could get, maybe I'd put up with it. But normally, I'd say, No thanks. I'd rather work some place where they DON'T hate me.
