Freely Available British and Irish Public Legal Information
[Home] [Databases] [World Law] [Multidatabase Search] [Help] [Feedback]
Industrial Tribunals Northern Ireland Decisions
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> Industrial Tribunals Northern Ireland Decisions >> Eves v HR Connect Department of Finance and Pers... [2011] NIIT 02536_10IT (24 August 2011)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/nie/cases/NIIT/2011/2536_10IT.html
[New search] [Printable RTF version] [Help]
THE INDUSTRIAL TRIBUNALS
CASE REF: 2536/10
CLAIMANT: Jonathan Eves
RESPONDENTS: HR Connect
Department of Finance and Personnel
DECISION ON REVIEW
The decision of the Chairman is that the claimant’s application for a review of the tribunal’s decision in this case should be refused under Rule 35 (3) of The Industrial Tribunals (Constitution and Rules of Procedure) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2005 (hereinafter referred to as “the Rules”), as there is no reasonable prospect of the decision being varied or revoked.
Chairman: Mr Cross
Reasons for the Chairman’s decision
1 The claimant seeks a rehearing of his case by a different tribunal on the ground that the present tribunal was biased against him. The Rules do not provide for such a possibility but do allow a party to apply to the tribunal to review its decision. The grounds for such a review are set out in Rule 34. Most of the reasons to justify such a review are to do with administrative matters that have gone wrong and the only ground for a review that could be applicable to this claimant is in Rule 34(3)(e), that “the interests of justice require such a review”.
2 On such an application for a review the chairman of the tribunal is, under Rule 35, required to consider the application and decide whether or not there is any ground for the decision to be reviewed, whereupon he would arrange for a hearing to consider the application. If he considers that there is no ground for the decision to be reviewed under Rule 34(3), or there is no reasonable prospect of the decision being varied or revoked, he will refuse the application for review.
3 I am accordingly treating the claimant’s letter of 9 August as an application for a review of the tribunal’s decision of 27 July 2011.
4 As stated in the decision, the tribunal held that the claimant’s claim of discrimination against him on the grounds of his race, was without any merit, as the interview panel had no way of knowing that the claimant claimed that he was a South African. This being the case, various items referred to in the claimant’s letter, of alleged race discrimination in other areas of the administration of the second named respondent are irrelevant.
5. The complaint, that the replies of the respondents to requests and orders of the tribunal for particulars and exchange of information, were subject to delay, is in part true, but the tribunal did not consider that that went to the basis of the complaint of discrimination and was a matter of administration which did not affect the ultimate hearing of the complaint which was given full consideration over nearly two days.
6. The remaining matters referred to in the claimant’s letter are of an evidential nature, where the tribunal preferred the evidence of the respondents’ witnesses to the evidence of the claimant. These matters cannot be the basis for a review of the decision.
7. The claimant states that in his opinion the tribunal was biased against him and was racially motivated against him. I can assure him that that was not the case, neither my colleagues nor I were in any way biased against the respondent or South Africans as a nationality.
I therefore find that the interests of justice would not be served by any further examination of this evidence set out in the claimant’s letter and refuse the application for a review of the decision of the tribunal, as it has no reasonable prospect of success.
Chairman:
Date decision recorded in register and issued to parties: