Claimant v Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust — 2024

The eleven claimants were consultant and specialist orthopaedic doctors and surgeons. They brought complaints of unauthorised deductions from wages under s.13 ERA 1996 arising from the Consultant of the Week arrangements. Before the reserved judgment was promulgated, the respondent conceded liability for the deduction amounts claimed, and the tribunal declared those complaints well founded; the reasons record that a consent order determining liability and remedy in part was attached.

Nine claimants then sought further compensation under s.24(2) ERA 1996 for consequential financial loss. The tribunal held that s.24(2) can in principle cover financial loss causatively linked to the non-payment, but it rejected the claim for interest on the deductions themselves because there is no statutory regime allowing interest on unlawful deduction awards. It directed itself to ask whether there was financial loss, whether it was attributable to the deduction, whether mitigation had been shown, and whether an award was appropriate in all the circumstances.

Applying that approach, the tribunal found that Mr Sangani had not proved an investment loss; Ms Mackay's claimed mortgage-overpayment loss was not attributable to the deductions and her accountancy fees were not recoverable under s.24(2); Mr Hakim had a pre-existing investing pattern and the tribunal accepted that he would have invested the money, but it still found no proved loss, no evidence of mitigation and no basis to award on fluctuating long-term investments; and Mr Toh, Mr Ahuja, Mr Adam, Mr Iyengar and Mr Selvan had insufficient evidence of their financial position, investment arrangements or prior mortgage-reduction patterns. The tribunal accepted Mr Nadkarni as a reliable and honest witness, but still found that he had not quantified a financial loss. It therefore made no awards under s.24(2) and noted, without needing to decide it, a possible interaction with s.26 ERA 1996.