Mr I Appleyard v London South Bank University — 2019

This was a preliminary hearing on the claimant's application to amend his ET1. The original form ticked unfair dismissal and other and stated breach of contract, but the tribunal found that it did not contain a detriment complaint under section 47B Employment Rights Act 1996 and did not include the three proposed individual respondents. The claimant therefore needed permission to amend in order to pursue the whistleblowing detriment complaint.

Applying Selkent Bus Company Limited v Moore, the Tribunal Rules of Procedure, the Presidential Guidance and the overriding objective, Employment Judge Nash refused the application to add Professors Turner, Haig and Ivey as individual respondents. The tribunal found that adding them was more than relabelling, that the application was materially out of time, and that ignorance of the law did not make it not reasonably practicable to have brought the complaint in time. The tribunal also noted the delay, the potential increase in length, complexity and cost, and the prejudice to the proposed individual respondents.

The tribunal granted the amendment against the university itself. It found that the material facts for the detriment complaint were already on the face of the ET1, that the amendment was to a different cause of action based on the same facts and against the same entity, and that the balance of hardship and prejudice favoured the claimant. The tribunal refused amendment in respect of allegation 13, saying it was not likely to amount to a detriment, and recorded that allegation 14 was no longer pursued. It also observed that any detriment forming part of the dismissal would fall within the unfair dismissal complaint rather than the detriment complaint, and that issues relating to redundancy selection might need separate attention at the final hearing.