England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE EMPLOYMENT APPEAL TRIBUNAL

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2 Wednesday, 4th July 2001

1. LORD JUSTICE MUMMERY: This is an application for permission to appeal. The application is made by Mr. Animadu in person. The decision which he wishes to appeal to this court is that of the Employment Appeal Tribunal, where the judgment was given on behalf of the Tribunal by Hooper J on 9th March 2001. The judgment was given at a preliminary hearing, dismissing Mr. Animadu's appeal from the decision of the Employment Tribunal at London Central following a hearing on 26th July 2000.
2. The extended reasons for the Employment Tribunal's decision were sent to the parties on 17th August 2000. The reason why the Employment Appeal Tribunal dismissed Mr. Animadu's appeal is that they were unable to find in the decision of the Employment Tribunal any error of law.
3. In order to obtain permission to appeal to this court Mr. Animadu has to satisfy the court, first, that his appeal has a real prospect of success and, second, as part of that, that there is an error of law in the decision of the Employment Tribunal. There is no general right of appeal to the Court of Appeal against decisions of the Employment Tribunal or Employment Appeal Tribunal. This court's jurisdiction is limited to correcting errors of law in the decisions of the tribunals.
4. The background to the case is that Mr. Animadu was employed by the respondent, Mastercare Service & Distribution Limited. He was employed as a customer service representative and PC support field engineer. He gave the dates of employment in his application to the Tribunal as from 10th November 1997 until 30th April 1998.
5. The particular application that I am concerned with was presented to the Tribunal on 21st March 2000. The complaint was of victimisation and discrimination on grounds of "race, ethnicity, et cetera", especially for the suppression and failure to provide the Employment Appeal Tribunal and Employment Tribunal until 21st February 2000 and today with compelling and vital details. The reference to the Employment Appeal Tribunal and the Employment Tribunal is explicable by the fact that Mr. Animadu had issued an earlier application to the Tribunal on 17th June 1998, shortly after his employment terminated, complaining of unfair dismissal and breach of contract. At a hearing of that application in the Employment Tribunal an attempt was made by Mr. Animadu to introduce a claim of race discrimination which the Tribunal held to be out of time. The Tribunal also refused to extend time, saying that it was not just and equitable to do so.
6. Mr. Animadu's appeal against that ruling to the Employment Appeal Tribunal was dismissed on 21st February 2000 for reasons given on behalf of the Tribunal in the judgment of the President. I am only concerned with the application issued on 21st March 2000. That was heard by the Employment Tribunal at London Central on 26th July. Mr. Animadu appeared in person. The Tribunal unanimously decided that Mr Animadu's claims of victimisation should be dismissed on the basis that the Tribunal had no jurisdiction to hear them. They also dismissed a further application, which was withdrawn by Mr. Animadu on the basis that it was a duplicate of the case which they had adjudicated upon in the extended reasons of 17th August 2000.
7. The Tribunal set out the factual background to the complaint, identified the issues, referred to the relevant provisions of the Race Relations Act and the decisions upon it, and came to the conclusion that it had no jurisdiction to entertain the particular complaint which Mr. Animadu had stated in his IT1.
8. Mr. Animadu appealed against that decision to the Employment Appeal Tribunal. At a preliminary hearing the Employment Appeal Tribunal reviewed the decision of the Employment Tribunal and came to this conclusion in paragraph 6: first, that they could see nothing in the decision of the Tribunal which could be described as perverse or showing any error of law, and in paragraph 8 said:

"Again, we have studied that conclusion with care, as also the alternative way the tribunal put the matter in paragraph (k). We can see no error of law. We unanimously take the view that the decision there set out cannot be described as perverse."

9. The Tribunal went on say that Mr Animadu had made a simple request to them. That was:

"Let me have an investigation into the matters of which I have complained."

10. Hooper J pointed out that the Appeal Tribunal had limited jurisdiction, in that it could only examine the decision of the Employment Tribunal to see whether it contained an error of law. The Appeal Tribunal had no jurisdiction to examine the merits of the claim. He went on to say:

"The Employment Tribunal reached the conclusion that the claims had to be dismissed and for the reasons that we have given, that was a decision which they were properly entitled to reach. As we have said, we have not seen the decision of the tribunal which the appellant tells us was reached in October 2000 concerning the substance of his complaints, namely, his unjust dismissal."

11. As I understand the position, when the substantive hearing of unfair dismissal and breach of contract complaints was heard by the Employment Tribunal in October 2000, Mr. Animadu was unsuccessful. I am not concerned with that decision. I am only concerned with the decision of the Employment Tribunal on the victimisation complaint heard in July 2000.
12. In his skeleton argument and notice of appeal, as amplified by Mr. Animadu this morning, it was made clear to the court as it was to the Employment Appeal Tribunal, that what Mr. Animadu wants is a hearing of his claim of race discrimination and victimisation. In his notice of appeal he says that he would want this court to make a number of orders: (1) to have the whole case remitted to a freshly constituted tribunal; (2) an order to hear the complaints on the IT1 of June 1998 about breach of co-operation and fair treatment, which has not been heard at any time; an order to the tribunal chairman to provide full notes of the hearings that took place on October 25th to 27th 2000, to include the answers of the witnesses, Mr. Went and Mr. Sutton, in response to the specific questions presented to them; (4) an order to the Metropolitan Police to release a CAD report 1886 of March 1998 which might bring some insight into speculations; (5) to repeat an order made by the Newcastle Tribunal to the respondent to provide comparable pay/overtime information from its record of those employees who were inducted at the same time with the applicant; (6) an order that the respondent pay outstanding expenses and actual overtime work, and (7) an order that the respondent provide all the missing service report sheets and all service report details regarding jobs of 21st to 22nd April 1998 as followed from records which are identified by number. Mr. Animadu submitted that those orders would be made by the Court of Appeal, if he is granted a full hearing because there are errors of law in the decisions of the Employment Tribunal and the Employment Appeal Tribunal in the consideration of his complaint of 21st March 2000. He sets out those points under paragraph 11 of his skeleton argument in the following way:

"(a) Whether established agreements (including Mastercare's severe unilateral warnings on compliance to the same) are a mockery of legally binding contracts or whether it is lawful to unilaterally disregard binding agreements without warning, notice or mutual agreement?

(b) Whether the Tribunals could overlook outstanding issues such as the ones, in the terms of employment on access to opportunities for promotion, transfer, training etc or the refusal and the deliberate omission to afford the applicant access to the same as mentioned in the first IT1 of 1998 and spelt out again in the authorised amendment of ET1 of 2000 before the hearing.

(c) Whether the Race Relations Act 1976 means what it seems to say in Part 11 sect 4(2)(c) where it purports to guarantee specific protection only after dismissal and not before the dismissal; provided that the claim was made within the time limit. The act did not make any distinction on the grounds of types of dismissal. The tribunal could have eventually put this to the test. Whether the respondent knew that the applicant was black etc.etc.etc.

(d) Whether there is any law that explicitly stops the tribunal from inferring and hearing a case that could lead to the conclusion of racial discrimination/victimisation even when it was not explicitly spelt out on the application but only implied.

(e) Whether it is lawful in the United Kingdom for one party to violate binding agreements without notice?

(f) Whether the Tribunal's power of discretion etc also includes the right to disregard submitted subject related written evidence or the right not to go into details?

(g) Whether the denial of a proper hearing itself is a perpetuation of racial discrimination/victimisation and social exclusion.

(h) Whether the statements made on ET1 applications to a Tribunal, are a guidance or statement of law that could not be explained or corrected?

(i) Whether it is in the interest of law and justice to issue restrictive and exclusive orders before all complaints have been heard?

(j) Whether the accusation of gross misconduct was due to the inability of the applicant or another Mastercare staff to issue or accept jobs according to the established conduct, rules and regulations of the company?"

13. Then, having set out all those detailed points, Mr. Animadu sets out the reasons why he has lost faith in the Employment Tribunals and judicial system. He complains that they have caused him almost the same pain as the way the case has been handled since 1998. He makes specific complaints about the way in which dates have been misquoted, pages have been missed out, evidence has been overlooked, which lead him to question whether the system is or is not institutionally racist. He says:

"It is almost like a rigged game where the goalpost is always or seemly unexplainably moved and foul play is constantly being overlooked by the referee. So why am I proceeding with the case/s? Firstly for the sake of controversy and secondly to test the system for what it is worth in this case."

14. He goes on to explain the basis of his discontent with the system generally and the way in which his complaint has been dealt with.
15. I have taken all these matters into account. I must add that Mr. Animadu in his skeleton argument gives further details of his arguments and cites authorities such as Glasgow City Council v Zafar. He has cited to me this morning a decision of the Employment Appeal Tribunal in Quereshi v Victoria University of Manchester as to the proper approach to be taken by Employment Tribunals to the consideration of claims of racial discrimination and victimisation. I have taken all the matters into account. In the end, I have to revert to the question I posed at the beginning of the judgment. As I explained to Mr. Animadu, I am a judge of the Court of Appeal with a limited jurisdiction, which is to decide whether this appeal has a real prospect of success on a point of law in the decision of the Employment Tribunal. I am not responsible, as I explained to him, for the setting up or operation of the employment tribunal system and the defects which he perceives in it. I have to focus on this one case. The position is this. For whatever reason, Mr. Animadu, when he left his employment, started proceedings against Mastercare Service and Distributions without making a complaint of race discrimination. His complaint was of unfair dismissal and breach of contract. That has been heard. It has been dismissed, though I understand from the papers that Mr Animadu may be seeking to appeal against the decision of the Employment Tribunal on those substantive complaints. That appeal would be to the Employment Appeal Tribunal. As for the complaints of race discrimination, it appears from the earlier decisions of the Employment Tribunal and the Employment Appeal Tribunal that in their view the complaints have been raised late, out of time and too late to be regarded as a case where it was just and equitable to extend the time. That was the substance of the decisions which were heard by the Employment Tribunal in 1998 and the Employment Appeal Tribunal by Lindsay J on 21st February 2000.
16. As for the particular case which has followed on in the form of the complaint of victimisation in the IT1 of 21st March 2000, I have formed the view that that was dealt with by the Employment Tribunal in its extended reasons of 17th August 2000 without committing any error of law. I agree with Hooper J in his judgment that the Employment Tribunal reached the decision which it did without committing any error of law or arriving at a decision which could be described as perverse.
17. I am aware that in reaching this conclusion I cannot begin to satisfy Mr. Animadu's discontent about the way his case has been handled or his perception of the shortcomings of the employment tribunal system. I am unable to help him with those matters. My decision is confined to one single point. There is no real prospect of success in his appeal against the decision of the Employment Appeal Tribunal given on 9th March 2001. There is no real prospect of that appeal succeeding because there is no error of law in the decision of the original tribunal. I therefore refuse to grant permission.
Order: Application refused.