United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	APPELLANT IN PERSON


 


JUDGE BYRT QC: This is an appeal against the determinations made by an Industrial Tribunal sitting at London South on 1 August at a prehearing review. On that occasion they listened to six applications in relation to six separate cases being brought by Mr England against various housing associations on the basis of one instance of unfair dismissal and in the remainder of the cases on the grounds of sex and race discrimination. The result of the applications was that the Industrial Tribunal allowed one case to go through to a full hearing. They allowed another one to go through to a full hearing on condition that the Applicant (now the Appellant) should pay a deposit of £50 because they had thought that the application had a slim chance of success.

The matter has now come forward to us at a preliminary hearing in order to see whether the Appellant is able to produce a point of law which is arguable before a full hearing of the Appeal Tribunal in respect of the application where conditional leave was given and of the four where leave was refused..

The substance of the Appellant's complaint against the initial hearing before the Industrial Tribunal is that he was never allowed properly to deploy his full argument in respect of each of the applications he was making and as a result he claims that he did not have a fair hearing. In particular, in relation to two of the applications where his originating application was substantially out of time, he says that he was not afforded the opportunity of arguing that the Industrial Tribunal should grant an extension of time to enable him to argue his case.

The allegations made by the Appellant are serious ones to make against any tribunal and we feel that if he were able to establish that ground it would enable him to succeed in his appeals. We notice that thus far no approach has been made to the Chairman of the Industrial Tribunal for his comments on the grounds of appeal and we feel that the Chairman should have the opportunity of tendering his observations. We feel the practical way to deal with this matter is to allow the appeals to go forward to a full hearing of the Employment Appeal Tribunal. In the meantime, the Chairman's comments should be solicited about the two principal points we have referred to above and about any other matter he thinks he should deal with. In addition to that, we think it would be of assistance to the Tribunal which is to hear these appeals if they had the Chairman's notes, first of Mr  England's submissions and evidence and, secondly, of the evidence given by Pat Taylor in relation to the application No. 12405 concerning the Broomleigh Housing Association. We, therefore, direct that those extracts from the notes be produced.

In the circumstances we have referred to above, we give leave for the five appeals before us to proceed to a full hearing.