Ms M Saveka v General Mills UK Limited — 2023

The case was listed for a five-day final hearing on 26 September 2023. Before evidence began, both sides made strike-out applications. The claimant applied to strike out the response and to adjourn, alleging that the respondent and its solicitor had engineered her eviction, harassed her with correspondence, mishandled personal data, hacked her LinkedIn profile, concealed and destroyed evidence, and used medical letters to keep her out of the hearing. The tribunal treated her as a vulnerable litigant, allowed breaks, and heard both applications the same day.

On the evidence before it, the tribunal rejected those allegations. It found the eviction theory highly improbable and unsupported by the redacted email and WhatsApp message relied on. It held that twelve emails over about four months was not excessive in litigation, that the solicitor's bundle correspondence was professionally restrained, and that there was no basis for the allegations of hacking, data misuse, concealment, or destruction of evidence. The medical letters and fit notes relied on by the claimant were not accepted as proof of respondent misconduct.

Applying rule 37 of the Employment Tribunal Rules 2013 and the strike-out authorities it cited, the tribunal first rejected the respondent's original application based only on the claimant's failure to provide a witness statement. However, once it had considered the claimant's strike-out application, it held that her extreme and unjustified allegations against the respondent and its solicitor were unreasonable, scandalous and vexatious, that a fair trial was no longer possible, and that strike-out of the whole claim was the proportionate response. No merits findings or remedy were made.