EAT Practice and Procedure : Appearance or Response – Right to be heard
A Respondent submitted a response late (it was sent in what should have been good time, but was sent 2nd class and under stamped). A default judgment followed, but as to liability only. The Respondent was notified of the remedy hearing and told that it could take part. However when the day before the date of the hearing the Respondent’s representative received a statement of the evidence the Claimant proposed to adduce at the hearing, and telephoned the Employment Tribunal, he was told that he could not take part since he was debarred from doing so in consequence of the response being late.
Held that where the rule spoke of not being ‘entitled to take any part in the proceedings’ this did not mean that the Respondent could not do so if invited, and did not preclude the Respondent asking to be permitted to do so. In the circumstances of this case, he would almost certainly have been permitted or invited to participate, even if he could not insist on it as of right, and accordingly a material procedural irregularity had occurred such that the appeal would be allowed.
Langstaff P JJ
[2013] UKEAT 0411 – 12 – 1010
Bailii
England and Wales
Employment
Updated: 26 November 2021; Ref: scu.518536