United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	NO ATTENDANCE BY OR ON BEHALF OF PARTIES


 


MR JUSTICE HOOPER

1. This is an appeal against a decision of the Employment Tribunal, Mr D R Crome as Chairman (Sitting alone). The Respondent made a complaint to the Tribunal on Form ET1. The thrust of the complaint was that he was entitled to redundancy money. The Appellant did not file a response and took no part in the proceedings.
2. We are told in a letter dated 28 July that the Appellant did not attend the Tribunal hearing because it understood that the Respondent would not be pursuing the case. There is no support for that proposition and in any event that would not explain why the Appellant did not file any response.
3. This case was originally due to be heard on 2 March and at the Appellant's request was vacated. On 21 February the appellant was told that the hearing would be today. Arrangements were made for a representative of ELAAS to be present in the building and see Mr Lomas at 9.30 this morning to discuss the case.
4. Attempts had been made this morning to contact Mr Lomas on his mobile phone. We are told that during a conversation with him the phone went dead. That may have been due to it being out of range. Thereafter attempts have been made to contact him again and we are told that the phone appears now to have been turned off completely. There has been no communication with this Tribunal indicating that Mr Lomas has particular difficulties about appearing here. In those circumstances we decided to go ahead with the Appeal.
5. The Chairman in his decision said that the Applicant had commenced employment with the Respondent in April 1995. He became subject later to PAYE regulations. He was employed as a scaffolder and the Chairman said that he was satisfied there was a contract of employment from April 1995. That contract came to an end when the Respondent was summarily dismissed, being told that there was no work for him.
6. The Chairman reached the conclusion that the termination was by reason of redundancy and that given that the Applicant had four years' continuous service and was aged 36 and taking into account his weekly wage, he was entitled to a redundancy payment of a sum of £920 and four weeks notice pay of £1,072.
7. Subsequently Mr Lomas was told that, without extended reasons, this Tribunal can refuse to hear the Appeal and his attention was drawn to the decision in William Hill Organisation v A Gravas (EAT/645/88). He therefore sought extended reasons. The Employment Tribunal replied that Mr Crome had directed that the Appellant should be told that since he had not entered an appearance, he had no standing to make the application. The request for extended reasons was declined.
8. In a letter dated 1 September Mr Lomas said that he wished to appeal against the refusal to give extended written reasons. We find no merit in that appeal. He also asked the Tribunal to exercise its discretion and hear the appeal on summary reasons. We decline to do so but in any event there is as far as we can see no arguable merit in this case.
9. In paragraph 6 of the Notice of Appeal the Appellant states:

"Mr Greenhow was sacked not made redundent 3^rd party involvement we prove this."

If that was the case it should have been presented to the Tribunal. It is now far too late to make this point. This Appeal is dismissed.