Mr A Wisdom v The Secretary of State for Justice — 2021

The claimant, an Approved Premises Area Manager, worked out-of-hours standby duties. He argued that the whole of each standby period was working time because he had to be contactable, fit for duty, able to deal with confidential calls and IT systems, and able to attend an approved premises within about an hour if needed. The respondent accepted that time spent actually dealing with calls was working time, but denied that the whole standby period was working time.

The tribunal considered the Working Time Regulations and authorities on standby and on-call working, including whether the constraints on the worker objectively and significantly limited the worker's ability to manage their own time. It found that the claimant's standby duties in ordinary non-pandemic periods involved substantial restrictions and regular work, but the claim before it was limited to 18 June to 17 September 2020.

For that three-month period, the tribunal found that the claimant had not proved that he received or dealt with any standby calls, gave actual guidance, or attended an approved premises while on standby. In those circumstances the tribunal found that the geographical and temporal restrictions did not objectively make the whole standby period working time, and therefore the claimant had not established a breach of regulation 10(1).