Ms. A. Fadipe, counsel for v Respondent — 2023

This was a preliminary hearing on the respondent's applications for costs and wasted costs, not a determination of the claimant's underlying constructive unfair dismissal, direct sex discrimination, harassment related to sex, and victimisation claims. The respondent said the claimant had failed to particularise the constructive unfair dismissal case properly and that the claimant's representative had acted improperly, unreasonably or negligently. It relied on Rule 76 and Rule 80 and said it had incurred £11,069 in costs since the further and better particulars were provided.

The Employment Judge compared the particulars of claim, the further and better particulars, the correspondence and the latest list of issues. The judge found that the factual basis for the first five alleged repudiatory breaches was already present in the particulars of claim, and that the sixth allegation was also referenced there. The judge accepted that the pleading was not easy to follow and could have been better organised or edited, but held that it was not so poorly drafted as to be negligent or otherwise unreasonable.

The tribunal also found that both representatives had contributed to a hostile and fractured correspondence pattern, which made agreement of the list of issues difficult. It did not accept that the claimant's conduct was vexatious, disruptive or otherwise unreasonable, and it did not find any improper, unreasonable or negligent act or omission by the claimant's representative. Applying the approach in Barnsley MBC v Yerrakalva, Ridehalgh v Horsefield and Mitchells Solicitors v Funkwerk Information Technologies York Ltd, the tribunal concluded that the thresholds for both applications were not met.

Both the costs application and the wasted costs application were therefore dismissed, and no costs order or wasted costs order was made.