Mr Legge and others v Nationwide Crash Repair Centres Ltd and others: 1309399/2020 and Others (See Schedule)
REASONS
[1]These claims form part of a larger multiple of protective award claims brought by former employees of various ‘Nationwide’ companies which operated motor repair centres at locations across the country.[2]The administrators of Nationwide have given permission for the protective award claims to proceed and have not actively defended the claims. Having regard to the fact that protective awards (or part thereof) will ultimately be met through public funds, the Tribunal has scrutinised the claims to ensure that proposed awards are appropriate in circumstances where it appeared that some of the claimants worked in smaller establishments in respect of which it appeared there was unlikely to have been a proposal to make 20 or more employees redundant (see USDAW and anor v Ethel Austin Ltd and ors [2015] ICR 675.)[3]Many of the claimants have provided information about their places of work and the numbers they believed were made redundant (or transferred) on the collapse of the Nationwide business. The administrator has also provided information, obtained, I understand, from the business’s electronic HR records, as to the sites the claimants were associated with, and the numbers made redundant from those sites.[4]I convened this hearing involving seven claimants because I had received conflicting information about various sites in the Midlands region. In particular, it appeared that a number of employees had been moved between sites in the period immediately before the collapse. I considered it was appropriate to hear evidence as to the operation of this group of sites (with a view to considering whether they were, in fact, separate establishments) as well as the particular circumstances of the individuals involved.[5]As it transpired, two of the claimants, based at the Warwick site, withdrew their claims before the hearing.[6]Of the remaining claimants, the administrators proposed that the claims of Mr Legge, Mr Nijjar and Mr Shields be determined by consent with protective awards made in their favour. This was on the basis that they were all assigned to the Daventry site, and 22 employees had been made redundant from that site.[7]The employees themselves had suggested lower numbers for Daventry and Mr Legge had indicated that he was allocated to Warwick. In view of this conflicting information, I determined that the hearing should go ahead to hear evidence. In the event, only Mr Legge attended.[8]Mr Legge worked at Warwick for many years, most recently as an Assistant Manager. He was placed on furlough in March 2020 when the Warwick site closed due to covid, but he returned to the site to finish outstanding work for a few weeks in June. Subsequently to that, he was redeployed to Daventry, which was open and undertaking new work. To the best of his knowledge, the Warwick site closed at this point. I infer that it was at this time that he was assigned to Daventry on the electronic HR system. He later also carried out some work at Hinckley, but was not reassigned on the system.[9]I am content, on the evidence I have heard, that Mr Legge was assigned to Daventry following the closure of his long-standing site at Warwick, and that this was not merely an error in the employer’s electronic recording systems. I am also content that the fluid position at the time (including the fact that some employees were still on furlough) led to other employees to underestimate the numbers at Daventry, and that there was, as the administrators have indicated, at least 20 proposed redundancies at that site. That means that all three of the Daventry claimants are entitled to an award.[10]I have made a 90-day protective award, in line with the proposals of the parties and the award made in related cases. Mrs Goggins[11]From information supplied by both Mrs Goggins and the administrators, it is agreed that she was assigned to the Coventry site and that fewer than 20 employees were proposed to be made redundant from this site. I directed that her case be listed as part of this hearing, as it may have been the case that the overall picture which emerged from the evidence about the Midlands sites might have assisted her. As it was, she did not attend the hearing. I decided to proceed with the case in her absence but Mr Legge could give no particular evidence about her circumstances or those of the Coventry site and I am therefore unable to make any protective award in her case.