Mr A Chaudhry v Cerberus Security and Monitoring Services Limited — 2020

This judgment determined two procedural applications in case 1807341/2019, not the underlying merits of the employment claims. The claimant's application dated 29 May 2020 for reconsideration of the judgment dated 18 May 2020 was refused under rule 72(1) of the Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013. The tribunal said the application simply repeated the grounds of the original application, raised nothing new, and did not show any prospect that the earlier judgment would be revoked or varied.

The respondent's application dated 3 June 2020 for strike out under rule 37 of the Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013 was also refused. The respondent relied mainly on the claimant's statement that it had not contacted him about the relevance of documents for the bundle; the tribunal assumed the claimant was wrong on that point and noted that the respondent's representatives had emailed him on 23 April 2020. However, the tribunal accepted that the claimant's main complaint was that the respondent had failed to include his documents in the agreed bundle, which it said was correct and had already been criticised by the tribunal.

The tribunal held that, even taking the respondent's case at its highest, it did not follow that a fair trial was no longer possible or that strike out would be a proportionate response. It described the respondent's strike out application as misconceived and said a fair trial was manifestly still possible.

The final paragraph records that, because of the effects of the pandemic, the hearing listed for 13-16 July 2020 could no longer proceed as listed. The tribunal directed that the hearing be postponed and that the case be listed for a short telephone hearing to deal with further case management, including possible alternative dispute resolution or judicial assessment, new hearing dates, and whether any future hearing should take place in person or remotely.