United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

BAILII case number: [1993] UKEAT 544_93_1512

Appeal No. EAT/544/93

I N T E R N A L

EMPOLYMENT APPEAL TRIBUNAL

58 VICTORIA EMBANKMENT, LONDON EC4Y 0DS

At the Tribunal

On 15 December 1993

Before

THE HONOURABLE MR JUSTICE TUCKER

MR R H PHIPPS

MRS P TURNER OBE

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MRS A MORAN          APPELLANT

LONDON BOROUGH OF BROMLEY          RESPONDENTS

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Transcript of Proceedings

JUDGMENT

PRELIMINARY HEARING

Revised


 


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APPEARANCES

For the Appellant IN PERSON


 


MR JUSTICE TUCKER: This is a Preliminary Hearing into an appeal by Mrs Ann Margaret Moran from a decision of an Industrial Tribunal sitting at Ashford, Kent on 24 March 1993. The Tribunal then unanimously decided that the Applicant's application should be dismissed. Her complaint had been that she had been unfairly dismissed by her employers who were the London Borough of Bromley.

In her Originating Application at paragraph 10 she stated:

"My redundancy was unnecessary and unauthorised as the Finance Committee had authorised 2.5 Full Time Equivalent posts to be deleted... After my redundancy was announced I was not offered any employment which I considered to be permanent."

The Applicant as she then was before the Industrial Tribunal, was represented by Mr Hawcock who was a NALGO Official. The Applicant complains about his representation and about his presentation of her case to the Tribunal. She now seeks to appeal against the Tribunal's finding. Her Grounds of Appeal have been set out in a number of manuscript documents all of which we have read. We have given the Appellant full opportunity of addressing us and she has done so. She has also placed before us a further bundle of documents, to some of which we have been referred.

So far as we understand her, the Appellant is saying two things. First that the group from which she was selected was not a legitimate group because the payroll department in which she was employed was separated into sections. She says that the employers should not have looked at her section in selecting candidates for redundancy because the reduction which had to be made was in another section of the payroll department, the Education section. She contends that it was from that section that the candidates for redundancy should have been selected. Secondly the Appellant says that the employers exceeded their authority by making more people redundant than they needed to. She claims that there were in any event 2.5 volunteers for the redundancies which were necessary. She points to a letter at page 27 of the Appeal Tribunal bundle stating that further redundancies might arise and we believe her argument is that it was wrong to speculate as to what redundancies might be needed in the future.

All these arguments, it seems to us, were raised before the Industrial Tribunal and considered by them and our impression is that the Appellant now seeks a re-hearing of those complaints. It is clear that she has a very deeply held grievance about the way she has been treated but we are not in a position to conduct a re-hearing. This Appeal Tribunal cannot hear arguments which have already been fully considered by a Tribunal. It can not normally hear fresh evidence. It does not review the evidence or weigh the evidence on which the Tribunal acted except in rare circumstances. An appeal lies to this Tribunal only on a question of law and despite asking the Appellant to identify the question of law which she asks us to decide, we are quite unable to agree that any of the points she has raised amount to questions of law. Of course, as a matter of law, this Appeal Tribunal is entitled to ask whether the decision reached by the Industrial Tribunal was perverse or not. If an Appellant can go so far as to demonstrate that it was perverse in the sense that it was a decision which no reasonable Tribunal properly directing itself could arrive at, then, as a matter of law, we can review it but that is not this situation.

We very much regret to say that Mrs Moran misconceives the function of this Appeal Tribunal if she supposes that we can review her case and reconsider arguments which have already been considered.

Our unanimous view is that this appeal does not raise any question of law. Accordingly it cannot be considered by this Tribunal and we dismiss it.