Mr N Stubbs (in person) For the v Respondent — 2021

Mr Stubbs started work for The Lucky Onion LLP in July 2018 and resigned in November 2018. For the preliminary hearing the effective date of termination was treated as 21 November 2018. He notified ACAS on 6 August 2020, received a certificate on 10 August 2020, and presented his tribunal claim on 11 February 2021.

On the unfair dismissal complaint, the tribunal held that the claim should have been presented by 20 February 2019, subject to the ACAS pause, and that it was reasonably practicable for Mr Stubbs to have brought it in time. The judge accepted that he was socially isolated and later had periods without fixed accommodation, but found that by June 2020 he knew he could bring a claim on a whistleblowing basis, knew about ACAS and the three-month limit, and could have notified ACAS then. Because he did not do so until August 2020, and did not present the claim until February 2021, the tribunal held that the claim was still out of time and that it had no jurisdiction.

The breach of contract claim was also struck out on time-limit grounds. The tribunal found that Mr Stubbs believed there had been a breach when he left the Respondent's employment, that he had access to the internet throughout, and that it was reasonably feasible for him to have made enquiries and presented the claim earlier. Separately, and only on the question of prospects of success, the tribunal said the alleged protected disclosure concerned an alleged breach of the claimant's own contract and was therefore personal in nature, that the whistleblowing case had little reasonable prospect of success, and that causation was also weak. The judge said that if a deposit order had been needed on the unfair dismissal allegation, it would have been set at £10, but no deposit order was made because the claims were struck out for lack of jurisdiction.