United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	MR I GERBER Director Global Signs Ltd Global House Stepfield Whitham CM8 3BZ


 


JUDGE PETER CLARK: By an originating application presented on 16 April 1997, the Respondent to this appeal, Mrs Leader, identified her claim as breach of contract against the Appellant, Global Signs Ltd, following a short period of employment as a sales office administrator which she alleged was from 27 January until 7 February 1997. In the notice of appearance the Appellant stated that she did not work for the period she said, without specifying the dates of employment which they contended applied.

The complaint came before a Chairman, Mr G Flint, sitting alone at Stratford on 8 October 1997. The Respondent attended, the Appellant did not. It seems, from the extended reasons given by the Chairman for his decision dated 5 November 1997, that the Appellant had, in correspondence, insisted on knowing the identity of the Chairman who was to hear their case, and also required a convenient time slot.

The Chairman treated the case as one of unlawful deduction from wages and accepting the Respondent's unchallenged evidence, as he saw it, and taking into account the Appellant's written representations, he awarded her £192.30, being one week's gross unpaid wages, from which tax and national insurance fell to be deducted by the Appellant.

Against that decision, the Appellant now appeals. Mr Gerber, a director of the Appellant Company, wishes to take essentially two points.

The first is that the Industrial Tribunal ought to have given this case a time marking to prevent unnecessary wasted time for the Company's three witnesses who were required to defend the claim and to pursue a counter-claim or set off on behalf of the Appellant. He asserts that administrative convenience prevailed over the interests of the litigant whom the Industrial Tribunals are there to serve.

We understand that this case was listed as a floating or unallocated cause. In these circumstances it might have been necessary, depending on the state of the other cases listed at Stratford that day, to have taken it in the morning.

We do not accept that such listing arrangements can properly be criticised in this appeal in the sense that to refuse to give a time marking amounts to an error of law on the part of the Industrial Tribunal. Accordingly, we reject this first ground of appeal.

The second ground is one raised for the first time today in oral argument, although not in the notice of appeal. Mr Gerber candidly accepts that it is a point which only occurred to him later when preparing for today's hearing. It is that the Chairman, Mr Flint, had sat on an earlier case involving this Appellant and had taken against them on that occasion. Mr Gerber has referred to a letter from the then Regional Chairman indicating but not, as we understand, guaranteeing, that Mr Flint would not sit on a case involving these Appellants in the future.

Again, we have no particular evidence before us of an appearance of bias on the part of the Chairman when dealing with this case of Mrs Leader and in these circumstances we have reached the conclusion that this appeal raises no arguable point of law to go forward to a full hearing and, accordingly, the appeal must be dismissed at this stage.