Ros v Brighton & Hove City Council & Ors

An Employment Tribunal’s reasons must identify the material issues, findings, applicable law and application of law to fact. The requirement is one of substance, however, and is not a drafting straitjacket. Reasons must be read as a whole and in their procedural context.

A concise conclusions section may be adequate where detailed findings of fact make clear why the claims failed. Tribunals need not address every disputed point or recite all evidence. An appellate court must not subject their reasons to unrealistically detailed scrutiny in order to identify artificial errors.

The Claimant appealed against an Employment Tribunal decision dismissing her complaints of unfair dismissal, disability discrimination, harassment, victimisation and failure to make reasonable adjustments. The Tribunal had found that her dismissal for capability was fair and that the Respondents’ actions were unrelated to disability or protected acts.

The appeal alleged that the Tribunal had failed adequately to identify and determine the issues, and had not given sufficient reasons. The challenges concerned, among other matters, the alleged alteration of duties, extension of probation, a basement task, redeployment and dismissal. The central issue was whether the Tribunal’s reasons, read as a whole, were adequate.

1. Appeal dismissed unanimously. The Tribunal’s reasons were adequate when read as a whole. Although the conclusions section was relatively brief and the reasons could have been more clearly structured, the Tribunal had identified the matters it had to decide and explained why the claims failed.

2. Rule 30(6) of the Employment Tribunal (Constitution and Rules of Procedure) Regulations 2004 provides a guide to the content of written reasons. It is good practice to comply expressly with its components, but a failure of form alone is not an error of law if the reasons, fairly read, demonstrate substantive compliance.

3. Applying Meek, the Tribunal had made detailed findings of fact which were fatal to the essential elements of the Claimant’s claims. Its general conclusions on the absence of less favourable treatment, the absence of a prima facie discrimination case, and the Respondents’ cogent non-discriminatory explanations drew those findings together. The parties could understand why they had won or lost.

4. The Tribunal did not have to make separate findings on every point advanced. Its factual findings established that there had been no alteration of the Claimant’s duties, that probation was extended because only limited duties had been performed, and that the basement task did not require heavy lifting and was accompanied by offers of assistance and adjustment.

5. The Tribunal had also adequately addressed redeployment and dismissal. It found that reasonable adjustments had been made or that no further reasonable adjustment would have prevented the disadvantage. It was entitled to find that capability was the reason for dismissal, that dismissal was fair, and that no discriminatory or retaliatory inference arose.

• Employment Appeal Tribunal: dismissed the Claimant’s appeal and upheld the Employment Tribunal’s dismissal of the claims.
• Employment Tribunal: reserved judgment with reasons sent to the parties on 3 January 2013. It dismissed claims of unfair dismissal and claims under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.