Employ a contractor as perm

[MrLizard]

hi, just a quick question hopefully, I have a contractor working for me at the moment in a 2nd line role.

We have advertised for a 3rd line role and they have applied for it. It isnt something I had considered before hand as I thought he wanted to stay as a contractor but evidently not. We would quite like to explore the idea but as he is from an agency im worried that we might owe them a large chunk of money.

Anyone with experience of this? I feel like if the agency made it essentially difficult for this guy to apply for a role above the role he is in you could claim they are (in)directly affecting his ability to progress his career ...

[MrLizard]

there is this clause - its minimum 12 months and the fee is obscene... like 95% of the cost of the 12 months.

The clause reads as though it is there to stop the contractor from contracting for the company without the agency though that might just be the way I want to read it