PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE – Amendment
PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE – Case management
JURISDICTIONAL POINTS – Extension of time: reasonably practicable
In a multiple holiday pay claim, the parties were unable to reach a mutual understanding of the effect of an ET decision (‘the first decision’) giving leave for claims to be amended so as to include unlawful deductions from wages claims which post-dated presentation of the claim forms, on the question of time limits.
At a Preliminary Hearing before a differently constituted Tribunal, the Tribunal held that the effect of the first decision was to preclude any argument on time limits and that no residual power to extend time remained (‘the second decision’). Those claims that were outside the primary three-month time limit were therefore dismissed.
On appeal from the second decision, the appeal was allowed. The second decision had varied the first decision which it had no power to do under Rule 29 ET Rules of Procedure (Serco Ltd v Wells [2016] ICR 768), and/or had in any event wrongly interpreted the first decision.
The second decision erred in purporting to preclude the Tribunal from determining the issue of time limits, which had not been decided and on which there had been no evidence or legal argument, since time limits are a jurisdictional issue for the Tribunal to resolve (Radakovits v Abbey National plc [2009] EWCA Civ 1346.
The case is remitted back for the Tribunal to decide the time limits issue.
Citations:
[2018] UKEAT 0103 – 17 – 2803
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Employment
Updated: 22 April 2022; Ref: scu.616878