New EAT Decisions

NEW EAT DECISIONS
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The following decisions have been placed on the EAT website in the last few days. The judgments can be downloaded from http://wood.ccta.gov.uk/eat/eatjudgments.nsf

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DAN KIEN TRAN v GREENWICH VIETNAM COMMUNITY PROJECT (Mr Recorder Langstaff QC, 5th April 2001)

A standard misconduct unfair dismissal case. It is of use because of the proposition laid down by the court - perhaps more clearly than in previous cases - that:

"We think that in general terms any employer who operated a disciplinary process in which he who investigated the alleged defence was he who judged it, or any employer who operated a disciplinary process in which there was no right of appeal, would (and in most cases perhaps should) be found to have been outside the bounds of the fairness required by section 98 of the Employment Rights Act 1996. It must be all the stronger when those two features are present in the same process."

This will be a very helpful quotation for Applicants who are pursuing claims involving procedural unfairness. Note, on the facts, the EAT did not interfere with the finding that the dismissal was fair.

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EKPE v METROPOLITAN POLICE COMMIESSIONER (Mr Recorder Langstaff QC, 25th May 2001)

This deals with the vexed question of what amounts to a disability. Several issues arose in the case. The interesting one deals with 'normal day-to-day activities'.

The Applicant had difficulty applying make-up and putting rollers in her hair. The tribunal held these were not 'normal day-to-day activity', because "they are activities carried out almost exclusively by women.
Secondly, using rollers is an activity that the Tribunal believes is only carried out by a minority of women. Even if the Tribunal is wrong as to the proportion of women who use rollers, it is clear that these are activities that are normal only for a particular group of people, namely mostly women."

The EAT overturned this, stating "we should nonetheless emphasise that what is normal cannot sensibly depend on asking the question whether the majority of people do it. The antithesis for the purposes of the Act is between that which is "normal" and that which is "abnormal" or "unusual" as a regular activity, judged by an objective population standard. Just as what is "substantial" for the purposes of the Act may best be understood by defining it as anything which is more than insubstantial, so too may what is "normal"
best be understood by defining it as anything which is not abnormal or unusual (or, in the words of the Guidance, "particular" to the individual applicant)."

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LLEWELLYN RYLAND LTD. v JONES & KEMP
(Charles J., 15th May 2001)

An unremarkable case on the facts. It contains a useful analysis of the extent to which tribunals are obliged to give reasons, and contains helpful guidance on Meek v City of Birmingham and subsequent cases. A good case to rely on when attacking a tribunal's decision as containing inadequate reasoning.