BAILII is celebrating 24 years of free online access to the law! Would you consider making a contribution?
No donation is too small. If every visitor before 31 December gives just £1, it will have a significant impact on BAILII's ability to continue providing free access to the law.
Thank you very much for your support!
 |
[Home] [Databases] [World Law] [Multidatabase Search] [Help] [Feedback] | |
United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal |
||
|
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal >> White v Sketchley Retail Ltd [1995] UKEAT 873_95_2811 (28 November 1995) URL: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/1995/873_95_2811.html Cite as: [1995] UKEAT 873_95_2811 |
||
[New search] [Help]
At the Tribunal
HIS HONOUR JUDGE H J BYRT QC
DR D GRIEVES CBE
MR R TODD
JUDGMENT
PRELIMINARY HEARING
Revised
APPEARANCES
For the Appellant NO APPEARANCE BY OR
ON BEHALF OF THE APPELLANT
JUDGE BYRT QC: This is an appeal against a decision of the Industrial Tribunal sitting at London (North) on 29 June 1995, when they came to the unanimous decision that the Applicant's claim, under Section 1 and Section 4 of the Race Relations Act 1976, be dismissed.
The Applicant (now the Appellant) appeals that decision and this is a preliminary hearing in order to determine whether this case should go forward to a full hearing of an appeal. The Appellant herself is not in attendance and so we are making a decision on the strength of the paper work that we have in front of us.
The facts quite shortly are that the Appellant, Miss White, worked for the Respondents for a period of some two months in August and September of 1994, as the manageress of a shop or unit called SupaSnaps which were contained on premises of their cleaning business in Tottenham Court Road.
The complaint of the Appellant was that she was discriminated against in a number of ways, and the first point she makes is that she was left to run this particular unit or shop called SupaSnaps entirely on her own. This meant that on days at the lunch hour, because of the influx of customers at that particular time, she would have no time off for lunch and would have to work throughout the working day on her own, whereas the cleaning shop, in which her particular unit was sited, was supported by a manageress and two assistants.
On 20 September, the manageress of the cleaning shop was away, and her assistant was in charge. The assistant, in fact, discovered that she had no keys with which to lock the premises. She reported the matter and in due course keys were sent down. Unhappily, they were the wrong keys, so in effect there were no keys to lock the premises. Surprisingly, the Appellant, as a manageress in her own right, did not have keys of her own, and again she makes complaint that this indicates an element of discrimination.
That evening, on the 20th, she spoke to a Mr Thomas, who was the relief manager at a support branch and she asked him what she was to do. Her mother had telephoned through to her, saying that she was ill and quite naturally, the Appellant wanted to go back to attend to her, but she had no key. She had a lock and chain and Mr Thomas said, "if you think that is satisfactory use it" so she did.
The next day she did not attend because she was looking after her mother, but she rang in. Shortly thereafter, the regional operation manager, Mr Woolley, got to hear of what he thought to be a breach of security in the locking up of the premises on 20 September, and commenced an investigation, and as a result of that, he decided to hold a disciplinary hearing.
Notice was given to the Appellant in writing. Unhappily, for reasons we are not acquainted with, it appears that the Appellant had but short notice of that disciplinary hearing and she makes complaint of that again and puts it down to, in some way, an element of discrimination. However, she was represented at that hearing and the matter was concluded. As a result of that hearing, she was dismissed. The Appellant did not make use of the internal appeal system thereafter.
The Appellant says that she was treated less favourably in all the respects which I have mentioned than she would have been treated had she been white or from another ethnic origin.
The Tribunal that heard this case initially, came to the view that the decision to dismiss her, in these circumstances, was very harsh, but that was not the point that they had to decide. They were not satisfied that another employee, who had been white or from a different ethnic origin, would have been treated any differently from the way in which the Appellant was treated and, as a result of that, they concluded that there had been no discrimination under the Race Relations Act.
It is important to remember that the Employment Appeal Tribunal has jurisdiction only to deal with questions of law. We are satisfied, from reading the Tribunal's reasons in this case, that they had correctly directed themselves on the relevant law.
The sole issues as to whether this lady was discriminated against within the meaning of the Act, solely turns on questions of fact and the only question we have to ask ourselves is, whether the findings of fact in the ultimate decision the Tribunal came to, were ones which a reasonable Tribunal could come to or whether it was a decision which no reasonable Tribunal could come to. We cannot say that in this particular case.
Accordingly, we do not think that there is any point left over in law or fact, to go forward to a full appeal hearing, and accordingly, we direct that this case be dismissed.
