REVEREND JG HARGREAVES v EVOLVE HOUSING + SUPPORT

A correction under Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013, rule 69, does not ordinarily restart time for an appeal or reconsideration. A fresh time limit arises only where the tribunal issues a decision as a complete substitution for, or replacement of, the original decision.

Exceptionally, time may be extended where the tribunal itself sends conflicting communications about the applicable time limit. A party is not necessarily required to resolve that uncertainty by urgent enquiry where no definitive administrative answer could safely be given.

The claimant brought Equality Act claims in the Employment Tribunal. Its written reasons made clear that one direct-discrimination complaint failed, but the judgment section erroneously recorded that it succeeded. The tribunal used rule 69 to delete that paragraph, issued a corrected copy, and warned that time still ran from the original decision.

On the same day, however, it sent a standard judgment letter stating that an appeal was generally to be made within 42 days of the decision sent to the parties. The claimant appealed by reference to the correction date. The Registrar held that time ran from the original decision but extended it. The respondent appealed that order.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Registrar was correct that the underlying appeal was late, but also correct to extend time so that it could proceed.

2. The Employment Tribunal properly used rule 69 of the Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013. Its reasons unambiguously decided that the direct-discrimination complaint had failed. The contrary statement in the judgment section was an accidental and inaccurate recording of that decision. Correcting it did not amount to a substantive reconsideration.

3. The ordinary rule, reflected in Aziz-Mir and Majekodunmi, is that a correction does not alter the original date of promulgation. The fact that rule 69 requires a corrected published version to be sent to the parties does not itself create a new appeal date. The exceptional feature of Aziz-Mir, Kennaugh and Patel was that a wholly fresh decision had been issued in substitution for the original.

4. Here, neither the certificate nor the corrected copy purported to substitute or replace the original decision. They identified a correction, retained the original date, and expressly stated that the time limits were unchanged. Time therefore ran from the original promulgation date.

5. Nevertheless, the standard letter sent with the corrected decision conveyed that the recipient had 42 days from that later decision. It contradicted the certificate’s warning and created uncertainty for which the claimant was not responsible. In those unusual and exceptional circumstances, an extension was justified under the guidance in Abdelghafar. It was not fair to treat the claimant as under a duty to obtain an urgent definitive answer from tribunal or EAT staff on a legally difficult question.

6. The substantive grounds of appeal were not so plainly hopeless as to justify refusing an extension. Their merits were left for consideration at the Rule 3(7) stage.

• Employment Appeal Tribunal: The respondent appealed the Registrar’s order extending time for the claimant’s proposed appeal. The appeal was dismissed.
• Employment Tribunal: The tribunal promulgated its reserved decision in May 2020, corrected an erroneous paragraph of the judgment under rule 69 in June 2020, and later refused reconsideration.