Mr T Dimitrov v Hippo Inns Ltd — 2019

At the preliminary hearing on 10 July 2020, Employment Judge Adkin dealt with an application to strike out and/or for deposit orders, together with an application to amend. The judge treated the claimant's later documents as further particulars rather than a new amendment, and noted the caution required when dealing with a litigant in person whose first language was not English. The tribunal also referred to the reluctance to strike out discrimination claims unless the case is plainly hopeless.

Direct marriage/civil partnership discrimination, direct sex discrimination, and victimisation were struck out under rule 37(a). The marriage/civil partnership claim failed because the claimant would not say that he was married or in a civil partnership, so he could not establish the protected characteristic; the judge also said that simply being asked about marital status did not obviously amount to discrimination or harassment. The direct sex discrimination claim failed because the claimant had stated in his particulars that he did not allege the treatment occurred because he was a man. The victimisation claim failed because the facts relied on did not disclose a protected act under the Equality Act, although they were relevant to the whistleblowing allegation.

The tribunal refused to strike out, or make deposit orders against, the age discrimination and/or harassment claim, the disability discrimination and/or harassment claim, the sex harassment claim, the sexual harassment claim, and the automatic unfair dismissal claim. The age allegation concerned a comment said to suggest the claimant should be ashamed to be in his role at his age, and the disability allegation concerned an alleged suggestion by the head chef that the claimant had a mental problem. The sex harassment and sexual harassment allegations concerned staff calling the claimant 'lovely' or 'sweetheart'; the judge said the claimant needed to particularise the facts more fully, but the claims could proceed. The dismissal claim under section 103A ERA 1996 was based on the 27 August 2019 letter about kitchen working conditions, which the tribunal considered capable of amounting to a protected disclosure with a public interest element.