United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	THE APPELLANT IN PERSON
For the Respondent	THE RESPONDENT NEITHER PRESENT NOR REPRESENTED


 


MR JUSTICE LINDSAY (PRESIDENT):

1. On 21st January 1999 there was a hearing at the Employment Tribunal at Exeter before the Chairman, Mr P R Anderson, sitting alone. The decision was promulgated on 28th January 1999. The decision was that the respondent, Howard Slater t/a Paramount Training Services, should pay to Mr B J Worth, the applicant, the sum of £3,999.99 in respect of outstanding wages. The decision then went on to say how the sum was to be paid.
2. Mr Slater, who appears before me today in person, did not attend nor was represented at that hearing on 21st January 1999. Although Mr Slater had earlier had solicitors, by the time of the hearing they had pulled out.
3. The decision, as I have said, was promulgated on 28th January 1999. Therefore the time for appealing against that decision expired on 3rd March 1999. There was no appeal against that substantive decision for the payment of £3,999.99. However, there had been an application by Mr Slater for a review of that decision. On 15th April 1999 there was another hearing at Exeter, again before Mr Anderson; the decision was promulgated on 20th April 1999. A Review was granted and the decision was varied so that it was not £3,999.99 that was now to be paid by Mr Slater but £2,444.44. So, to that extent, Mr Slater had a modest success on that review hearing. Mr Worth did not attend that review hearing but Mr Slater did.
4. The time for appealing against the decision promulgated on 20th April expired on 1st June 1999. It was not until 14th June 1999 that Mr Slater's Notice of Appeal was received. The Notice of Appeal is, on the face of things at any rate, directed only to the decision of 15th April 1999, promulgated on the 20th.
5. On 29th June 1999 Mr Slater asked for an extension of time to lodge that Notice of Appeal I apprehend that in the meantime he had been told by the EAT that it was not good enough simply to send an out-of-time Notice of Appeal, one had to make an application for an extension of time. Moreover, he would be likely to have been told that the application for an extension of time had to be accompanied by reasons given for failing to be in time.
6. The learned Registrar on 16th July 1999 read Mr Slater's application for an extension of time and declined to grant an extension. On 19th July 1999 Mr Slater appealed against the Registrar's refusal to extend time. On 22nd September 1999 we had a letter from Mr Slater to the EAT.
7. It is quite plain from listening to Mr Slater in person today, that he is, as he puts it, at his "wit's end". He has been subjected, he says, to concern and distress as a result of this litigation which now has led to a County Court case against him, presumably by Mr Worth, and that case also had the effect that because of the County Court proceedings hanging over him he cannot obtain contracts for work as freely as might otherwise be the case.
8. Mr Slater also urges that Mr Worth was a fraudster and lied and that the substantive decision was based on a whole series of deceptions by Mr Worth who managed to convince the tribunal at that first substantive hearing in a way that was totally unjustified.
9. That, unfortunately, is not a matter for me to go into. I have to decide whether an extension of time should be granted to Mr Slater. The leading case in this area is United Arab Emirates v Abdelghafar and I have reread that case to remind myself of the principles on which an extension of time is to be granted or withheld. I have in mind that Mr Slater succeeded in being granted a review but that there still had never been any timely application to appeal against the earlier substantive decision of January 1999.
10. To judge from what he says to me today and, indeed from his letters, Mr Slater is really urging not so much simply an appeal against the review decision but, more fundamentally, he seeks to put in question the whole substantive award going back to the decision of January 1999. A very compelling reason indeed would need to be given on the facts of this case if an extension of time were to be granted in relation to the decision of January 1999. If, as seems to be the case, Mr Slater's case, although directed against the decision of April 1999, really seeks to put in issue the matters that were decided January 1999. I think it is fair to have in mind that that earlier decision afforded an opportunity for it to be reviewed and was reviewed in Mr Slater's favour.
11. I listen with sympathy to Mr Slater's worries and his concerns but if I direct myself, as I must, in accordance with the Abdelghafar case, I need to find, as I say, a compelling reason why an extension of time should be granted. I bear in mind that effectively, given the case Mr Slater wishes to raise, that compelling reason has to relate not simply to the review decision of April but also to the substantive decision of January 1999.
12. I have not heard anything that truly amounts to a compelling reason to extend time, either in relation to the decision of April 1999 or that of January 1999, still less to both of them. Although one has sympathy for Mr Slater's position, this is not an occasion for a review of the merits of the underlying case, and certainly not an opportunity at which it can be examined whether Mr Worth truly was a fraudster, whether he truly did lie. Simply looking to the matter, as I am required to do, chiefly in terms of whether Mr Slater has come forward with a good explanation of the delay, I find no such explanation. Accordingly, I must dismiss the appeal.