Ms A. Dannreuther, counsel For v Respondent — 2023

The claimant worked for the British Council in Dubai as an HR Business Partner for the MENA region from 20 March 2016 until her dismissal on 31 December 2020. Her contract said it was a local indefinite contract based in Dubai and governed by UAE law. The tribunal recorded that she had never worked in or travelled on business to the UK, that her pay and benefits were local, and that her role was focused on HR support for the LEVANT Cluster. She brought claims for unfair dismissal, pregnancy or maternity discrimination and redundancy pay, and the respondent challenged the tribunal's territorial jurisdiction.

The tribunal applied the Lawson, Duncombe, Ravat and Jeffery line of authority on territorial scope. It found that the claimant was a truly expatriate employee with a strong territorial pull to the UAE, but rejected the submission that she was a lynchpin between the UK and the region or a representative of the respondent's UK operations. It accepted that the claimant's contract was governed by UAE law and that, as a matter of expectation, she would ordinarily have looked to the UAE legal system to enforce her rights.

The tribunal also found, on the balance of probabilities, that the claimant would not have been able to sue the British Council in the UAE because the respondent would have successfully relied on diplomatic immunity. It held that this inability to obtain redress, together with the British Council's status, its relationship with the British Embassy, its public authority characteristics, and the respondent's assurances and conduct, severed the UAE connection sufficiently to bring the claims within the legislative grasp of the ERA and the EqA. The tribunal further held that the claimant was within the UK's jurisdiction for Article 1 ECHR purposes, that Article 6 was engaged, and that the HRA was relevant to the interpretive exercise.

The result was a preliminary ruling that the tribunal had territorial jurisdiction to hear the claimant's substantive complaints. No merits findings or compensation were made in this judgment; the claims were directed to proceed, with further case management left for a later preliminary hearing.