Mrs K Clayton v Bright Blue Foods Limited — 2022

This judgment, dated 6 February 2023 and sent on 9 February 2023, was a reconsideration decision heard in chambers by Employment Judge Porter sitting alone. Mrs K Clayton applied for revocation of the costs order made on 25 May 2022. The tribunal decided the application on the papers, with no oral evidence heard and no statement of financial means provided. It referred to Rule 70 and the overriding objective in Rule 2, and relied on Outasight VB Ltd v Brown when considering the interests of justice.

The tribunal accepted that the 25 May 2022 hearing had been a private case management hearing and that strike out should not have been considered at that hearing, so there had been errors in the conduct of the original hearing. It also accepted that paragraph 21.9 of the earlier written reasons was incorrect in saying the hearing had been listed specifically to consider strike out. However, the tribunal found those errors did not make revocation necessary in the interests of justice.

The tribunal found that the hearing had been listed because the claimant had raised disclosure issues and had applied for strike out or an Unless Order. Both parties attended expecting those disclosure issues and applications to be dealt with. The tribunal concluded there were no genuine disclosure issues requiring determination, that the claimant's application was completely without merit, and that she had acted unreasonably in pursuing allegations of failure to disclose and the associated applications. It described the preliminary hearing as a waste of time and costs and, for those reasons, refused the application to revoke the costs order and confirmed it.