Mr C Hadrill, Solicitor For the v Respondent — 2023

At a public preliminary hearing before Employment Judge Stout sitting alone, the tribunal considered limitation only. The claimant's pleaded case included constructive unfair dismissal, failure to make reasonable adjustments, race-related harassment and victimisation. By the hearing, some claims had already been accepted as out of time, and the remaining live issues were the race-related harassment complaint tied to the 2 July 2020 tweet and two victimisation complaints concerning the grievance outcome of 30 May 2022 and the appeal outcome of 22 August 2022. The ET1 was filed on 13 January 2023, after the agreed limitation dates of 23 October 2022 for the victimisation complaints and 22 December 2022 for the race-related harassment complaint.

The tribunal applied s.123 EA 2010 and the just and equitable discretion, together with the ACAS Early Conciliation rules in s.140B EA 2010. It accepted that wrong legal advice from three lawyers explained why the claims were not presented earlier, and it accepted the claimant's evidence as honest and unchallenged. The judgment referred to Robertson, Adedeji, Kumari, Apelogun-Gabriels, Pearce, Chohan, Steeds, Virdi and Robinson when setting out the approach to extension of time and the effect of solicitor error.

Despite that explanation, the tribunal refused to extend time. It held that the victimisation complaints were nearly two and a half months late, and that the respondent had a legitimate interest in finality once the primary time limit had expired. The race-related harassment complaint was only 22 days late on the face of it, but it depended on a tweet from 2 July 2020, more than two years earlier, and the tribunal considered the claim weak on the limited material before it. Balancing the prejudice to both sides, it dismissed all claims as out of time, noting that any remedy would lie, if at all, against the claimant's solicitors.