Case 1305909/2023 · Employment Tribunal
Ms Rachael Anne Brennan v Ravenstall Ltd OPEN PRELIMINARY HEARING — 2024
- Case reference
- 1305909/2023
- Decision date
- 20 August 2024
- Jurisdiction
- England & Wales
- Judge
- Employment Judge Gilroy KC
Parties
2 namedClaimant
Ms Rachael Anne Brennan
Respondent
Key findings
Tribunal's reasoningThis was a public preliminary hearing before Employment Judge Gilroy KC on 6 August 2024 to decide whether the tribunal had jurisdiction to hear Ravenstall Ltd's breach of contract counterclaim. The claimant, Ms Rachael Anne Brennan, had brought claims for unpaid wages, holiday pay and notice pay. The respondent said she had misappropriated around £12,000 and relied on a counterclaim, while also pointing to earlier County Court proceedings that it had issued against her on substantially the same subject matter.
The tribunal recorded that the County Court claim had been struck out for failure to comply with an order requiring fresh Particulars of Claim, and that no formal merits hearing had taken place in that court. Applying the law on res judicata, the judge considered cause of action estoppel and issue estoppel, including the authorities discussed in Gray v Police Appeals Tribunal, Kok Hoong v Liong Cheong Kwang Minds Limited and Ozer Properties Ltd v Ghaydi.
The tribunal held that cause of action estoppel did not arise because the County Court claim had been framed as fraud, which is distinct from the breach of contract counterclaim now sought in the tribunal. It also held that issue estoppel did not arise because the County Court default strike-out did not determine an issue with complete precision. For those reasons, there was no res judicata bar and the respondent was permitted to pursue its counterclaim in these proceedings. No merits finding or remedy was determined in this judgment.
Claims and outcomes
1 finding recorded| Claim type | Issue or finding | Outcome | Protected characteristic | Award |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Breach of contract | Preliminary issue only. The tribunal held that res judicata did not bar the respondent's breach of contract counterclaim and permitted it to be pursued in the Employment Tribunal. No merits determination or monetary award was made. | Other | — | — |
Legal tests applied
6 references- res judicata
- cause of action estoppel
- issue estoppel
- Gray v Police Appeals Tribunal
- Kok Hoong v Liong Cheong Kwang Minds Limited
- Ozer Properties Ltd v Ghaydi
Official outcome judgment PDF
Gov.uk primary recordThe official judgment PDF on gov.uk contains the tribunal's outcome, reasoning, and any remedy details. Where this page does not yet show extracted outcomes for every claim, use the PDF as the authoritative source.
Published on gov.uk under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
How we got this data
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