Hall v Louei

The Employment Tribunal is the primary fact-finding body. Appeals to the Employment Appeal Tribunal and thereafter to the Court of Appeal lie only on a point of law. Dissatisfaction with the assessment of oral and documentary evidence cannot justify appellate intervention without an arguable legal error. Recasting a challenge to factual findings as an allegation of bias does not establish an arguable appeal where the alleged conduct falls far short of a prima facie case of bias.

The applicant sought permission to appeal part of an Employment Appeal Tribunal order made on a preliminary hearing. The underlying Employment Tribunal had found that the respondent was a worker under the Employment Rights Act 1996, had been employed personally by the applicant, and had suffered an unlawful deduction from wages.

The Employment Appeal Tribunal permitted the employer-identity issue to proceed to a full hearing but refused permission on a bias ground. The applicant challenged the fact-finding process, the assessment of competing evidence and the tribunal chairman’s conduct. The central issue was whether those complaints disclosed an arguable point of law warranting permission to appeal.

1. Application refused. Permission to appeal was refused in relation to the bias ground. The applicant retained the hearing already permitted on the separate issue concerning the identity of the respondent’s employer.
2. The statutory employment appeal structure makes the Employment Tribunal the fact-finding tribunal. Appeals from the Employment Tribunal to the Employment Appeal Tribunal, and from that tribunal to the Court of Appeal, are confined to points of law. Strong dissatisfaction with adverse factual findings does not itself provide a basis for appellate intervention.
3. The applicant’s complaints were essentially challenges to the Employment Tribunal’s findings that the respondent’s evidence should be accepted and to its treatment of other evidence. Counsel had attempted to put those complaints into the legally permissible form of an allegation of bias. However, the alleged errors in dealing with the evidence did not come within any measurable distance of establishing even a prima facie case of bias.
4. There was no arguable basis for reversing the Employment Appeal Tribunal’s refusal to allow the bias ground to proceed. Any evidence relevant to the employer-identity issue, including evidence bearing indirectly on that issue, was a matter for the Employment Appeal Tribunal to assess.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): In [2001] EWCA Civ 1982, permission to appeal was refused on the bias ground. The order allowing the employer-identity issue to proceed to a full hearing was left undisturbed.
• Employment Appeal Tribunal: On 6 September 2001, at a preliminary hearing, the tribunal allowed the employer-identity issue to proceed but refused permission for the bias ground.
• Employment Tribunal: On 16 January 2001, the tribunal found that the respondent was a worker, was employed personally by the applicant, and had suffered an unlawful deduction of wages.