Mr JC Woods v The Secretary of State for Justice and 2 others — 2022

This was a reserved preliminary judgment concerning strike out, deposit orders and amendment, not a final merits decision. The claimant brought complaints of harassment related to sexual orientation, age and race, victimisation and trade union detriment arising from disciplinary investigation and disciplinary proceedings after an earlier tribunal claim had settled by COT3. The first respondent accepted liability for any pleaded acts or omissions of the second and third respondents, and the complaints against those individual respondents were dismissed upon withdrawal.

The tribunal refused the respondents' application to strike out all or part of the complaints. It found that the first three factual allegations, in their various formulations as victimisation, harassment and trade union detriment, were on the face of it caught by the COT3 agreement from the earlier proceedings. The tribunal held that the claimant did not have no reasonable prospect of setting aside the COT3, but did have little reasonable prospect of doing so, and therefore ordered deposits of £100 for each of 15 specific allegations, totalling £1,500 if all were pursued.

The tribunal held that the allegation about being invited to a disciplinary hearing could not proceed as pleaded insofar as it relied on what was allegedly said at judicial mediation, because of judicial proceedings immunity, but gave the claimant an opportunity to amend so that the complaint could proceed without that reference. The tribunal allowed the claimant's amendment application to add age and sex discrimination complaints about the handling of a later grievance, noting reservations about the strength of those complaints but finding that the balance of prejudice favoured allowing the amendment.