United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	THE APPELLANT NEITHER PRESENT NOR REPRESENTED


 


MR RECORDER UNDERHILL QC:

1. The tribunal has received, yesterday, a fax from the appellant in the following terms:

"I am writing to inform you that due to personal circumstances connected to earthquake in birthplace in Gujurat, India, I am unable to attend the preliminary hearing of my appeal this morning and I therefore cannot proceed with my appeal."

2. Although, on the face of it, that appears to be a withdrawal of the appeal, it appears to us that the appellant may be under the belief that if he does not attend in person on this preliminary hearing, his appeal cannot proceed. That, of course, is not correct. We do not believe that it would be fair simply to dismiss the appeal without a consideration of the merits. The members of the tribunal had, prior to receipt of the fax, all considered the tribunal's reasons and the Notice of Appeal, and we are in a position to deal with the appeal on the merits. Inevitably, however, our reasons will be briefer than they would have been had we heard argument.
3. The appellant's claim in these proceedings was for racial discrimination and victimisation. The respondents were his employers and two individual managers. He relied on a number of particular episodes of alleged discrimination or victimisation.
4. The application was heard over eleven days in the Employment Tribunal in Shrewsbury in June 2000. The tribunal in long and careful extended reasons, sent to the parties on 11th July 2000, dealt with each aspect of his claim in turn and found against him on all aspects.
5. The Notice of Appeal divides into two heads. The first is concerned with the respondents' operation of its grievance procedure. It alleges that the decision of the tribunal that the grievance procedure was not operated discriminatorily was perverse in two respects, which are identified in the Notice. We are satisfied from the materials available to us that there are no grounds for believing that the decision to which the tribunal came was not one which was open to it on the facts and the evidence which it recites; and that the appellant's real attack is simply against a legitimate finding of fact.
6. A perversity point is also taken in relation to the second head raised by the grounds of appeal, which relates to the CNC review carried out by the respondents. Again, we can see no basis for challenging the tribunal's findings of fact as the appellant seeks to do. In this connection a point is also taken that the tribunal does not sufficiently explain why it accepted the evidence of the witness principally responsible for the CNC review, Mr Harris, when, the appellant submits, his explanations were on any view unsatisfactory. It is not apparent to us that the tribunal were bound to find Mr Harris' explanations unsatisfactory. Nor were they obliged to explain in detail why they accepted them: it is sufficient that they considered them and recorded that they found them satisfactory. We can see no error of law here.
7. In these circumstances the appeal is dismissed.