United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	No appearance or representation by or on behalf of the Appellant


 


JUDGE JOHN BYRT: This is a Preliminary Hearing in an Appeal against a decision promulgated on 10th December 1998 of an Employment Tribunal sitting in Leeds. That Tribunal held that the Applicant's claim of racial discrimination fails and the employee, Miss Sohanpaul appeals.

Quite shortly, the facts are that she worked as a key maid at the Marriott Hotel in Leeds and that hotel has a leisure centre. In January 1998, Miss Sohanpaul saw an advertisement there for the position of a fitness instructor and she accordingly, applied. She was interviewed and unhappily, at the end of the day she was notified by letter dated 4th February 1998 that she had been unsuccessful. The only complaint made during the course of the Employment Tribunal hearing seems to have been that there were various questions that were not put to her which had been on a list which was put to other applicants for the job. The principal witness for the Respondents, a Miss Ball, states that she was quite sure that they had been put and the Employment Tribunal accepted Miss Ball's evidence on that point.

After Miss Sohanpaul had been notified that she had been unsuccessful, she went and saw a Miss Bell, who was Head of the Leisure Centre and she was told that the contest had been between herself and another candidate. The other candidate was better qualified and that was a finding of the Employment Tribunal. The Tribunal would have had the IT.3 filed by the Respondents before them and that set out in full the qualifications of the person who did get the job.

It is plain that at the end of the day, the Employment Tribunal came to the conclusion, having reviewed the interview process and the way that Miss Sohanpaul had been treated during that process, that she had not been treated less favourably by reason of the fact that she was of Asian origin. They did however, come to the conclusion that some of the comments made about her seemed a bit rough but they noted that similar robust comments had been made about other candidates as well, who were white people.

The Notice of Appeal filed in this case, stresses that the basis upon which Miss Sohanpaul would wish to argue her appeal is that the Tribunal focused its attention upon a claim based on Section 4(1)(c) of the Race Relations Act, whereas the argument which had taken place before the Employment Tribunal had been under Section 4(1)(a) and indeed, all the grounds of appeal upon which Miss Sohanpaul relies are under that particular Section, but it is noticeable that the Tribunal, in stating its reasons for its decision, does not direct its attention to any aspect of the arrangements that were made by the Employer for the interview process. When one looks at Miss Sohanpaul's own IT.1 there is a total absence of any reference to any complaint made about the arrangements which would indicate that her claim was under Section 4(1)(a).

Accordingly, whilst we have some sympathy for the fact that Miss Sohanpaul has not secured her chosen employment in this particular instance, we do not see that there is any criticism that can be made of the Employment Tribunal's decision, directed as it was to the one aspect which the IT.1 seemed to direct it to, namely under Section 4(1)(c). She now seeks to put her case up on a different basis, and in our judgment that is something she cannot do. It would seem from the reasons and everything else we have seen is the way of documents that the argument she now seeks to put forward by way of appeal was never addressed before the Tribunal.

In those circumstances, we feel that her appeal is unarguable and it is best that it is stopped here rather than go forward to a full hearing. Accordingly, we dismiss the appeal.