United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	THE APPELLANT NEITHER PRESENT NOR REPRESENTED


 


JUDGE WILSON: This is the preliminary hearing for the proposed appeal by the original applicant against the decision of the Employment Tribunal sitting at London (South) that the applicant had not been unfairly dismissed and had not been discriminated against on the grounds of his race.

1. The proposed appellant has informed the tribunal office that he does not intend to appear to prosecute this preliminary hearing. He has, however, submitted a skeleton argument, although he has not indicated whether he wishes the tribunal to proceed on the papers before it. Similarly he has not given any reason for not attending today and we have decided that the way to proceed is to consider the matter on the papers as if we had been invited so to do.
2. The applicant complains of ongoing racial discrimination and victimisation. He is of Afro-Caribbean origin and has been an administrative officer at Peckham Police Station since 1995. He complains of unfair dismissal as a separate issue.
3. The tribunal dealt with the matter and gave extended reasons for their finding that there was a degree of conflict between the evidence given by the applicant and that given on behalf of the respondent by their witnesses. The Employment Tribunal stated that they preferred, wherever there was conflict, the evidence of the respondent, because the applicant appeared to have jumped to conclusions about his treatment without being in full possession of the facts, whereas the explanations given by the respondent appeared to be reasoned and corroborated by the evidence placed before the tribunal.
4. The applicant was employed as a civilian officer and academically was very highly qualified. But throughout the period of his employment there was a continuing process of reorganisation. There were various matters which arose during the earlier years of his service and there came a time in June 1996 where the applicant purported to act as a legal representative for a friend who was involved in a criminal investigation. The respondent was concerned that a member of its civilian staff should have become involved in this way and those concerns surrounded both his involvement and also the possible misuse of information to which he had access. There was an investigation but it was discontinued because there was insufficient evidence. Disciplinary proceedings had been commenced but they were withdrawn. The applicant was not subject to any disciplinary penalty or detriment. He felt that he was unreasonably pressurised by one of his superiors, although he did not claim that that superior said anything that had a racial content.
5. In November 1996 the applicant had asked whether he could work part-time in a local law centre. That seemed to the respondent to involve a question of conflict of interest and he withdrew his formal application. He nevertheless maintains that the refusal to permit outside work was racially discriminatory.
6. The tribunal went on to deal with various other incidents through 1997 and 1998 and dealt also with the constructive dismissal claim. In paragraph 9 of its decision the tribunal found that the applicant failed to show any one breach by the respondent which could have been construed as fundamental thus giving him the right to repudiate the contract. Further, he failed to show a series of breaches, which in total could be so construed. He brought no evidence to show an act committed by the respondent on or around August 1997 to lead to his resignation. In any case, by failing to act promptly until August 1998, the tribunal found that the applicant had acquiesced in the breach and had thus waived his right to resign as a result of it.
7. So far as race discrimination was concerned, the tribunal found in paragraph 11 that the applicant did not make it clear either in his application or in his evidence on what precise grounds his claim for victimisation lay. He said in evidence that he was aware of the proper procedure for brining complaints but he chose not to make any complaint at any time. The tribunal concluded that it could find no incident of racial discrimination arising out of this issue and, even if it was wrong in that finding, the allegation could not found a valid claim before the tribunal because it occurred more than three months before the presentation of the applicant's first application to the tribunal.
8. We have studied the contents of the skeleton argument submitted by the proposed appellant and his reference to the law and also his comments on the Chairman's response to his affidavit concerning proceedings at the Employment Tribunal. We can find nothing in them to persuade us that this application would have any prospect of success if it were to proceed to a full hearing. Accordingly, we dismiss it at this stage.