United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	MR P TODD (Solicitor) Hopkin & Sons Eden Court Crow Hill Drive Mansfield NG19 7AE


 


MR JUSTICE BELL: This is an ex-parte Preliminary Hearing against the decision of an Industrial Tribunal sitting at Nottingham, entered in the Register on 13 November 1997. The Appellant worked for the Respondent public company as a Revenue Protection Officer. While he was on long jury service from January to July 1996, the nature of his work was changed in some respects to which he took exception. He then fell ill. In his Originating Application he claimed that he was dismissed on 31 January 1997 either by being dismissed by reason of redundancy or by constructive dismissal (being driven out) and that his dismissal was unfair.

The Respondent argued that the Appellant resigned taking selective voluntary severance (SVS), an option which he himself first raised and then pursued when his employer, the Respondent, was reluctant to consider it because he was ill. The letter to Mr Street from his employer dated 30 January 1997, which finally brought matters to an end is headed "Termination of Employment by Reason of Redundancy": in the table of payments to be made to Mr Street the first is £5,460 "Statutory Redundancy Payment".

Mr Todd's argument, on behalf of the Appellant, is that the Industrial Tribunal considered the history leading up to the letter and looked at the whole matter in the round and decided that this was not redundancy at all. Mr Todd contends that the Tribunal was not entitled to reach that conclusion in the face of a clear written agreement speaking of termination by reason of redundancy, which was in fact the last step in the history and which "clinched" the way in which the employee, Mr Street, was to leave his employment.

It may very well be that on a full hearing of this matter the Employment Appeal Tribunal will hold that the Industrial Tribunal took the proper course in considering all possible indicators of the circumstances and basis upon which Mr Street left his employment, of which the letter of 30 January 1997 was but one factor however potentially important. But it does seem to us that Mr Todd has as an argument to put forward on a full inter-parties hearing of the appeal to the effect that at the end of the day it was agreed between the parties that what was in the letter of 30 January 1997 encapsulated the basis upon which Mr Street was leaving his employment and that that was only consistent with dismissal by way of redundancy.

What the Industrial Tribunal did not do, as Mr Todd, in effect, concedes that it might have done, had it chosen to, was find dismissal by reason of redundancy but then looking at all the circumstances that the case go on to hold that that dismissal was not unfair. That is not a matter which we, as an appeal tribunal, can revive here. The matter will be allowed to go ahead to a full hearing.