Steel v London Borough of Haringey (Unlawful Deduction from Wages)

A pre-implementation benchmark job evaluation may remain effective under a collective pay agreement where the parties have agreed that it will stand. It may nevertheless be replaced by a re-evaluation where the agreed conditions for a challenge are met, including where a different job description is adopted.

An appeal tribunal will not interfere with factual findings that were open to the Employment Tribunal on oral and documentary evidence. Employment Tribunal reasons must be read as a whole. They remain adequate where the tribunal answers an agreed list of issues by reference to earlier, clear findings, or sensibly groups the issues into a broader question.

The Claimant, employed as a gardener, alleged unlawful deductions from wages. She contended that a 2007 benchmark evaluation placed her job at scale 4 under the Respondent's Single Status arrangements.

Her claim had initially been held outside the Employment Tribunal's jurisdiction, but an earlier appeal succeeded and the matter was remitted. On remission, the Employment Tribunal found that management and trade unions had agreed that benchmark evaluations would stand unless challenged. A new composite job description for gardeners was subsequently evaluated at scale 3 in accordance with the agreement.

The Employment Tribunal dismissed the claim, save for a conceded small underpayment. The central issues on this appeal were whether the re-evaluation was permissible and whether the Employment Tribunal's findings and reasons disclosed an error of law.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Employment Tribunal was not bound by the earlier EAT decision to hold conclusively that the 2007 benchmark evaluation was effective under the Single Status Agreement. That decision expressed a possible, though likely, construction and remitted factual and legal issues for determination.
2. The Employment Tribunal was entitled, on the further oral and documentary evidence, to find that the collective agreement had been varied by agreement between management and trade unions. The variation allowed earlier benchmark evaluations to stand unless a party sought an evaluation using a different job description or an evaluation by Human Resources.
3. The adoption of a new job description covering gardeners at different grades was a proper basis for re-evaluation. On either party's case, it supplied a valid reason to revisit the earlier benchmark result. The Employment Tribunal was entitled to find that the 2009 scale 3 evaluation was undertaken under the agreed job-evaluation process and was not affected by departmental budgetary hopes or expectations.
4. The challenged factual findings had an evidential basis. The Employment Appeal Tribunal could not substitute its own assessment of documentary weight for that of the Employment Tribunal, which had also heard relevant oral evidence. The findings were neither unsupported by evidence nor perverse.
5. The reasons were adequate under rule 30(6) of the Employment Tribunals (Constitution and Rules of Procedure) Regulations 2004. They had to be read as a whole. A typographical error in a summary answer did not require clarification because the detailed findings made the intended answer plain. The Employment Tribunal could also consolidate the agreed issues into a broader key question where it still addressed their substance and gave the parties a fair opportunity to address it.

• Employment Appeal Tribunal: appeal dismissed.
• Employment Tribunal, Watford: dismissed the unlawful-deduction claim, save for a small conceded underpayment; judgment sent to the parties on 6 March 2013.
• Employment Tribunal: an earlier tribunal had held the claim outside its jurisdiction in May 2011. An earlier EAT appeal succeeded and remitted the claim to a different tribunal.