10/01/2011
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There is no right to have cases heard in the region where a claimant is employed.
HJ Underhill the president of the EAT ruled that the Regional Employment Judge was entitled to transfer cases from London South to London Central areas. The main reasons were so that the four cases could be better case-managed together, and so that one of the cases dealing with state immunity would be benefit from the London Central Tribunal's experience.
The EAT decided that there is no right to have cases heard in the region where a claimant is employed.
The claims for unfair dismissal, racial and religious discrimination and sums due were therefore to be heard at the London Central Employment Tribunal.
A temporary restricted reporting order was made by the London South Tribunal regarding a Mr Faleye’s two claims, purportedly pursuant to rule 50 (2) of the Employment Tribunal Rules of Procedure.
There was a question of whether one of the parties had actually been present at an interlocutory hearing but in the absence of a prompt request for a case management order made to be set aside the HJ Underhill would under section 35 of the Employment Tribunals Act 1996 have made the same order and therefore saw no injustice in the decision to have the case transferred to London Central.
Flannery v Halifax Estate Agencies Ltd [2000] 1 WLR 377 was quoted regarding where particular arguments are run it is the Judge's duty to deal with those arguments. The judge questioned the direct relevance of Flannery to an interlocutory decision which did not need to be separately dealt with here.
An attempt to introduce Article 6 of the European Convention of Human Rights was rejected by the EAT as irrelevant.
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