Ms A Yates First Respondent (R1): Caritas Recruitment Limited Second Respondent (R2): Lambeth Borough Council v Respondent — 2022

At the preliminary hearing on 5 November 2021, the claimant sought permission to amend her claim to add victimisation based on non-payment of £55.80 in bus fares for daily travel to and from work. She said the expenses had previously been paid and that she had complained about the issue. The tribunal applied Selkent Bus Co Ltd v Moore and section 123(1)(b) Equality Act 2010, found the proposed victimisation complaint was a new cause of action, that the conduct complained of arose between 29 July 2019 and 8 November 2019, and that the delay in raising it was about 15 months and was not explained.

The tribunal refused to extend time. It found the claimant had not linked the unpaid expenses to the discrimination claims in her original ET1, that the respondents were already defending the expenses issue as a contractual dispute, and that allowing a victimisation claim at that stage would prejudice them because it would require significantly more evidence and witnesses recalling events from two years earlier. The application to amend was therefore refused.

On R2's strike out application, the tribunal considered the direct religion or belief discrimination claim only so far as it related to a Facebook post said to have been made by Mr Jennings. It accepted that the account was personal, that his employer was not identified on the profile or in the post, and that the post was not made in the course of employment within section 109 Equality Act 2010. The tribunal held that R2 could not be vicariously liable and, under rule 37(1)(a), struck out the discrete Facebook part of the claim because it had no reasonable prospect of success; it did not need to decide R2's alternative argument on direct discrimination.