ETZ 4(WR) IN THE EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNAL (SCOTLAND) AT EDINBURGH Judgment of the Employment Tribunal in Case No: 4100321/2020 (A) Heard at Edinburgh before a full Tribunal on the Cloud Based Video Platform (“CVP”) on th and th October 2020 Employment Judge J G d’Inverno Tribunal Member Ms J Chalmers Tribunal Member Mr A Ward Ms W Rowbotham v - Solicitor per Unionline Scotland Fife Health Board — 2020

The claimant sought a declaration and compensation of £460 under TULR(C)A, arguing that she should have been paid for 11.5 hours for each of 10 trade union training days rather than the 7 hours per day that the respondent paid. The tribunal found that the claimant's working hours were her rostered hours under section 173, that the training did not take place during working hours, and that the claimant had requested and been granted permission for 10 x 7 hour training sessions.

The tribunal accepted that the claimant was paid for the 7 hours spent in training on each occasion and that, across the relevant four-week periods, she worked the balance of her contracted hours so that she suffered no loss of earnings. It held that the claimant's request, as pursued at grievance and before the tribunal, was in substance for payment for 4.5 additional hours per training day when she was neither training nor working, and that no evidential basis was established for treating 7 hours of training as equivalent to 11.5 hours of nursing work.

On construction of the legislation, the tribunal held that the request fell outwith sections 168, 169 and 170 because the training was not during working hours. It further held that the respondent's policy on facilities arrangements, read with the ACAS Code of Practice, required payment for the time actually spent in training and that this was reasonable in the circumstances. The tribunal referred to sections 168, 169 and 173 of TULR(C)A, the ACAS Code paragraphs 18 and 19, and the authorities in Hairsine and Howlett in reaching that conclusion.

The tribunal therefore rejected the claimant's argument that she was entitled to an additional 45 hours of pay or to compensation calculated by reference to that figure, and it dismissed the claim in full. No monetary award was made.