Appeal No.	 EAT/6/2000

EMPLOYMENT APPEAL TRIBUNAL
58 VICTORIA EMBANKMENT, LONDON EC4Y 0DS

	At the Tribunal
	On 29 March 2000

Before
HIS HONOUR JUDGE COLLINS CBE
MR D CHADWICK
MRS M T PROSSER

APEX LOGISTICS LTD	APPELLANTS

MR J T CONHEENEY	RESPONDENT

Transcript of Proceedings

JUDGMENT

PRELIMINARY HEARING

Revised

	APPEARANCES

For the Appellants	NO APPEARANCE OR
REPRESENTATION
BY OR ON BEHALF OF
THE APPELLANTS	

JUDGE  COLLINS:	

1	This is the preliminary hearing of an appeal against the decision of a Chairman alone sitting at Liverpool, her extended reasons having been promulgated on 9 November 1999.  The sole question before the tribunal was whether the respondent was a worker for the purposes of section 230 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, it not being in dispute that the appellants had deducted £1,300 from remuneration to which she would otherwise have been entered.  The issue was whether or not the respondent was a self-employed independent contractor.

2	The Chairman heard the evidence and made it perfectly clear that wherever the evidence of the parties was in conflict, she preferred the evidence of the respondent.  He was a parcel deliverer employed from 16 March 1999 until 1 April 1999.  She held that the contract was for him to be paid £100 a day, out of which he was to provide a van and petrol and that wrongful deductions had been made on the unagreed basis that he would only be paid £25 a day while he was learning the job and the unagreed basis that he would have to pay an insurance excess and for a damaged tail light.  

3	The appellant has not attended today to pursue the appeal.  In our judgment the Chairman’s reasons were reasons entirely based on findings of fact which she made after hearing the evidence and which are unappealable.  This is a hopeless appeal and will be dismissed.