United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal

APPEARANCES

 

For the Appellant	NO APPEARANCE OR REPRESENTATION BY OR ON BEHALF OF THE APPELLANT


 


JUDGE J McMULLEN QC:

1 There are before me today three applications. The first is an appeal by Mr Banerji, the Applicant in proceedings presently under way, as I understand it, before a Birmingham Employment Tribunal. The appeal is against a decision of the Registrar not to allow registration of the appeal because it was 160 days out of time.

2 In substance the Applicant contends that a direction given at a hearing by an Employment Tribunal Chairman in case management is wrong. The Chairman in this part of his directions ordered sequential exchange of Witness Statements. The Applicant contended that was wrong and still contends it is wrong. He was at the relevant time represented by the Commission for Racial Equality which has subsequently withdrawn support for his case.

3 The order made by the Chairman, sent to the parties on 17 October 2002, has now been complied with in that the Applicant has produced his Witness Statement and, as I understand it, a hearing was set for 6 May for five days.

4 There are two fundamental objections to the Applicant's case. Insufficient basis has been given to me, or to the Registrar to allow this case to go forward for I have read his letter of 31 March 2003, in response to the Registrar's initial rejection of the appeal and it contains nothing which would justify an extension of time beyond the 42 days. I have in mind the guidance given by the Court of Appeal in Aziz v Bethnal Green City Challenge Co Ltd and United Arab Emerates v Abdelghafar.

5 Of equal importance is the fact that this case is now academic, since the order complained of has been complied with. I can see no error of law in the Registrar's decision not to grant an extension of time and I dismiss the appeal.

6 I then turn to the two applications made under Rule 3(10). Mr Banerji narrowly escaped the striking out of his Originating Application, for the Tribunal on 26 March ruled that his conduct was deliberate and he had failed deliberately to comply with orders of the Tribunal, such conduct teetering on the very edge of the sort of behaviour which would attract a strike-out order. Nevertheless, he survived.

7 The basis upon which an appeal has been launched is again in substance that the Tribunal ought not to have made the order for sequential statements. This appeal was dealt with by a judge who recommended the Registrar exercise her power to take no futher action. On 12 June 2003, she decided that no question of law arose and thus directed the Applicant to consider his position under Rules 3(8) and (10). In my judgment no error appears in the Registrar's consideration of the Notice of Appeal, both because the order has been complied with and because intrinsically no question of law arises in the documents Mr Banerji has submitted. The Rule 3 application is dismissed and I uphold the Registrar's decision. Thus, I have dealt with decisions dated 26 March and 22 April 2003

8 I then turn to the other application which also arises out of the decision of the Employment Tribunal on 22 April. Again, this appeal was rejected by the Registrar and I can see no error in her approach to these two appeals, neither of them raising any question of law, both of them being based upon an academic point. In any event, they are not susceptible except in the most extreme circumstances to an appeal here, since all three of these appeals concern case management properly conducted by an Employment Tribunal with its hands firmly on the levers for the efficient conduct of the proceedings, as the EAT Practice Direction paragraph 11 makes clear. Therefore, all three proceedings this morning are dismissed and no further action will be taken and the Notices of Appeal are dismissed.