Dr K Connaughton v 15 Greater Glasgow Health Board — 2023

Dr K Connaughton, a GP partner in the Bridgeton Health Centre practice, brought claims concerning unpaid leave, accrued annual leave and future paid leave under the Working Time Regulations 1998, the Working Time Directive and section 13 of the Employment Rights Act 1996. The tribunal dealt only with a preliminary issue: whether he was the respondent Health Board’s worker for those purposes. It held that he was not.

On the domestic law analysis, the tribunal found that the 2018 GMS contract was between Greater Glasgow Health Board and the partnership, Drs Connaughton & Sudomir, not the claimant personally. The tribunal held that section 230(3)(b) ERA 1996 and regulation 2 WTR 1998 require the claimant and the respondent to be parties to the same contract, and that the claimant’s obligation to provide at least 10 hours of patient care was owed by the partnership as contractor, not by him individually. It relied on the fact that the partnership had separate legal personality under Scots law and that the claimant had signed on behalf of the partnership.

The tribunal also rejected the argument that the EU law definition of worker under the Working Time Directive applied. It found that the claimant’s independence was not merely notional: the partnership decided on staffing, locum cover, annual leave, administration and much of the day-to-day running of the practice; the respondent had no line-management role, no direct power to direct the claimant’s work, and no power to remove him personally from providing services under the contract. The tribunal therefore concluded that he was not a worker under EU law either, and the claims did not succeed.