United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	MR R STILES Sittingbourne Citizens Advice Bureau 17a Station Street Sittingbourne Kent ME10 3DU


 


MRS JUSTICE SMITH: This is the preliminary hearing of an appeal by Miss Tina Jones from the decision of a Chairman sitting alone at the Industrial Tribunal at Ashford on 11 February 1998.

The Chairman ruled that the Appellant was not entitled to bring a claim for unfair dismissal and/or for the enforcement of various other statutory rights, because she had not completed a period of two years' employment with the Respondent, Mr Ahmed. However, in her Notice of Appeal, which is in the form of a letter, she makes the point that her Originating Application, which was also in the form of a letter with documents attached, claimed that she had been dismissed as the result of victimisation. The victimisation took the form of a dismissal because she had sought to assert her statutory rights. That being so, her case is that she is entitled to present a claim in respect of her dismissal, even though she had not completed two years' service. It seems to us that that is a good arguable point.

We are concerned that Miss Jones, who was not represented at all before the Chairman, failed to demonstrate to the Chairman that that was the nature of her claim. He does not mention victimisation in his decision.

Accordingly, we allow this case to proceed to a full hearing before the Employment Appeal Tribunal. We grant leave to the Appellant to amend her Notice of Appeal and we hope that she will receive the help and advice that she needs, in order to draft a Notice of Appeal in proper form and also to present her case at the full hearing.

Because we recognise that Miss Jones needs to seek advice, we allow 28 days for the amended Notice of Appeal to be filed. We shall set the case down for a one-hour hearing under Category C.