Case 3201963/2020 · Employment Tribunal

Ms Y Luwoye v Saul D Harrison & Sons plc and 1 other — 2021

Case reference: 3201963/2020
Decision date: 6 July 2021
Jurisdiction: England & Wales
Judge: Employment Judge Russell Representation
Venue: East London Hearing Centre

Indexed: 23 May 2026

Parties

3 named

Claimant

Ms Y Luwoye

Respondents

Key findings

Tribunal's reasoning

Ms Y Luwoye worked as a Financial Accountant from 2 September 2019 until 29 January 2020. After her dismissal she appealed by email on 5 February 2020, the appeal hearing took place on 19 February 2020, and the appeal was rejected by letter dated 26 February 2020. The dismissal and appeal correspondence stated that the reason for dismissal included her management style, and the appeal letter recorded her explanation that her hand gestures and direct speaking reflected her previous work in France and Nigeria.

The first Employment Tribunal claim was presented on 31 July 2020 and originally included unfair dismissal, race discrimination, religion and belief discrimination and wrongful dismissal. By this hearing the ordinary unfair dismissal claim had already been struck out because she did not have two years' continuous service. Judge Gardiner had also refused most of an amendment application, allowing only a direct race discrimination complaint about failure to respond to a reference request made on 29 January 2020.

The second claim, issued on 16 November 2020, was struck out in full. The tribunal held that it was presented out of time under section 123 Equality Act 2010 because the last relied-on detriment was 4 August 2020 and ACAS early conciliation should have started by 3 November 2020, making the claim 13 days late. In deciding whether it was just and equitable to extend time, the judge considered the medical evidence, the fact that the claimant had been able to present her first claim and instruct representatives, and the balance of prejudice. The tribunal found that the medical evidence did not show she was too unwell to pursue her rights, and that the claim was a weak one, so time was not extended.

The respondent's application to strike out the first claim was refused. Although the reference complaint appeared weak on the papers, the judge held that it required testing in evidence and could not be said to have no reasonable prospects of success. The judgment records that the claimant had clarified a further request to Mr Rule and Mr Naidu through her recruitment agency, and the tribunal therefore left the first claim to be determined later.

Claims and outcomes

2 findings recorded

This case has mixed outcomes under at least one legal claim type. A tribunal can uphold some allegations and dismiss others under the same legal head, so rows below may represent separate issues or allegation groups from the judgment.

Claim type	Issue or finding	Outcome	Protected characteristic	Award
Other	The second claim against both respondents was struck out in its entirety as out of time. The tribunal refused to extend time under section 123 Equality Act 2010 and treated the late complaint as weak; the reasoning was framed around alleged race discrimination in the post-dismissal grievance correspondence.	Struck out	—	—
Other	The respondent's application to strike out the first claim was refused. The tribunal held that the reference complaint and related detriments could not be said to have no reasonable prospects of success without evidence, so the first claim remained live.	Other	—	—

Legal tests applied

4 references

Official outcome judgment PDF

Gov.uk primary record

The official judgment PDF on gov.uk contains the tribunal's outcome, reasoning, and any remedy details. Where this page does not yet show extracted outcomes for every claim, use the PDF as the authoritative source.

Published on gov.uk under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

How we got this data

Case essentials (reference, date, judge, venue, country, claim categories) are extracted from the structured metadata gov.uk publishes alongside each decision. Parties and monetary figures are extracted from the judgment PDF text. Key findings and per-claim outcomes require a second extraction pass that is not yet complete for this case — until then, the primary source linked above is the authoritative record. See full methodology.

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