Mr D McCauley v Granby Toxteth Development Trust Limited — 2020

This was a paper judgment on an application to extend time and reopen the tribunal’s earlier decision in the claimant’s unfair dismissal case. The earlier judgment, sent on 11 April 2011, had dismissed the unfair dismissal claim. The current judgment records that the original tribunal had found a genuine redundancy situation, that a pool for possible redundancies had been established, that the respondent warned and consulted employees, and that the claimant was given a chance to go through his marking. The tribunal had also noted that the claimant’s marks were far below those of the other two employees in the pool.

The claimant applied on 4 August 2020, more than nine years later, saying that changing cultural attitudes and Black Lives Matter meant the case should be reopened and alleging bias and lack of integrity in the 2011 tribunal. Regional Employment Judge Franey held that there were no good grounds for extending time. The judgment refers to rule 71 on the 14-day time limit for reconsideration, rule 5 on extensions of time, and the overriding objective in rule 2, together with the principle of finality in litigation as stated in Ministry of Justice v Burton and the guidance in Liddington v 2Gether NHS Foundation Trust.

The tribunal found that allegations of bias or lack of integrity could have been raised in 2011 and were not prevented by the legal or cultural climate of the time. It also held that reopening a case concluded in 2011 after such a long delay offended the principle of finality and that a fair trial of the events in 2021 would not be possible because of the passage of time. Time was therefore not extended, and the application for reconsideration was dismissed. The judge added that, even if time had been extended, the application would have been dismissed because there was no reasonable prospect of the 2011 decision being varied or revoked.