Bryan v Ford Motor Company [1994] UKEAT 923_94_1212

EAT
Bryan v Ford Motor Company
[1994] UKEAT 923_94_1212 · 1994-12-12

JUDGE HULL QC :

This is an Appeal to us by Mr Bryan, who is a gentleman now aged 63 years. He was employed by the Ford Motor Company between 1966 or 1967 and 1973. He had been previously employed by well-known concerns, by the General Post Office and by British Insulated Callenders Cables and then his employment began with Ford.All went well, apparently, until 1970 when various very untoward events took place. We cannot go into all the details, but among things which happened were that Mr Bryan was arrested, he says wrongly, for driving whilst under the influence or whilst over the limit for alcohol. He said that was quite wrong and he was falsely charged with that. He was also, he says, wrongly charged with assaulting a police officer, that was false too. His son was arrested, he says, in 1972 and he himself was subjected to humiliating treatment in connection with that and he thinks that it was all part of a plot. The nature of the plot as we understand it, or conspiracy, which he alleges, was that somebody at Ford, resenting his application for a job in a supervisory position, and wishing to persecute him, was able to liaise with the police and persuade the police to do the dirty work, so to speak, for the company, or for the person concerned. That led to his persecution in this way. As he says himself, "I should not have believed that such a thing could happen in this country."The net result was that he served at least six months in prison, after having been remanded in custody, when he appeared apparently on the charge of assaulting a police officer. In due course, after he had been sent to prison, not surprisingly Ford Motor Company terminated his employment, which was as a driver.We do not know exactly what Mr Bryan has been engaged in since then. He may have had various employments. But the next thing that happened, so he says, was that in 1992, the true position was suggested to him, as he puts it, by a workmate. He says that in 1992, "I was advised by a workmate that the trouble came from a foreman." He was advised by various organisations, the Race Relations Commission, apparently, and the C.A.B advised him, and others too.He then, having been so told in 1992, on the 23rd November 1993, presented a complaint to an Industrial Tribunal complaining that 20 years before, he had been unfairly dismissed by Ford Motor Company, and claiming compensation. The Industrial Tribunal had to decide whether they could entertain this complaint, which on the face of it was more than 20 years out of time.Their Decision is with our papers. They held that they did not have jurisdiction to entertain the complaint. They went through the story rather more thoroughly than I have done, and they said:
"This is an unusual case since it involved a dismissal that occurred over 20 years ago and therefore involves legislation and Rules of Procedure not seen for a considerable time. In 1973, complaints of unfair dismissal were brought under Section 106 of the Industrial Relations Act 1971. The relevant rules regarding such complaints were contained in the Industrial Tribunals (Industrial Relations, etc) Regulations 1972 and Rule 2(1) of the Rules of Procedure provided that:-
"In relation to proceedings on complaints under Section 106 of the 1971 Act, a Tribunal shall not entertain such a complaint unless it is presented before the end of the period of four weeks beginning - (a) in the case of a complaint relating to dismissal with the effective date of termination......unless the Tribunal is satisfied that in the circumstances it was not practicable for the complaint to be presented before the end of that period."
The Tribunal was satisfied that it was not practicable for Mr Bryan to present his complaint before the end of four weeks which would have expired some time in November 1973. It accepted that he was not aware of his right to complain and it also accepted that, in any event, he had tried to send letters to the Respondents and to the National Council for Civil Liberties but that those letters had been prevented from being passed on by the prison authorities.It would seem from the way that the rule was written that if it was not practicable for the complaint to be presented before the end of the four weeks' period then there would be no time limit applicable to making such a complaint at all. However, the Tribunal noted the case Westward Circuits Limited v Reid [1973] IRT 8 Page 320 in which Sir John Donaldson (as he then was) said at page 324:-
"..........on a literal reading of the rule, if once the Tribunal is satisfied that it was impracticable to present the claim within the limited period, it might appear that the claim could be entertained however late it was presented. We do not consider that that is the true construction of the rule. The intention both of the Act and of the rule is that claims for compensation shall be presented promptly. In our judgment, if the circumstances are such that the Tribunal has jurisdiction to entertain a late claim, it then has a discretion whether or not to do so. In exercising that discretion it should have regard to the fact that Parliament expected that claims could generally be presented within a four week period and should consider whether the complainant has acted as swiftly and practicable [sic] in all the circumstances."
Accordingly, the Tribunal took into account various matters including the fact that Mr Bryan had seen the Respondents' personnel officer almost as soon as he came out of prison to find out about his job; that Mr Bryan had sought advice from the Commission for Racial Equality, the Citizens Advice Bureau and other such organisations in 1974; that he had seen his convenor in 1974 or 1975; and that in 1992 he had known that he could complain to an Industrial Tribunal but did not in the event present his complaint until 23 November 1993. The Tribunal also took into account that the dismissal had occurred over 20 years previously. In the light of all those matters, the Tribunal decided that it should not exercise its discretion to entertain Mr Bryan's complaint of unfair dismissal. Accordingly the Tribunal unanimously decided that it did not have jurisdiction to hear Mr Bryan's complaint."Now it is from that Decision that Mr Bryan appeals to us. I will not set out the contents of his Notice of Appeal and the other documents which he has sent to us, because they extend over 20 pages or more of manuscript.He sets out the story which I have shortly related, and complains that he was being persecuted. That is the substance of what he sets out in his Appeal. Of course, that is not what we are directly concerned with, although he has asked us to consider all those matters. What we are directly concerned with is whether there is any point of law which we could entertain.Parliament set up our jurisdiction in Section 136 of the Act; it says that Appeal lies to us on a point of law. We have no jurisdiction to hear Appeals on questions of fact. What we have to do is to find out if there is any error of law in and about the Decision of the Tribunal. Now here the Tribunal appear to have devoted themselves, with great care, to what was put in front of them, and looked up the old rules. On the face of it, it would be extraordinary if they were to entertain an Application alleging unfairness more than 20 years ago. But they nonetheless applied themselves to it with great care and they said that in the exercise of their discretion, they could not entertain the Appeal as it was so belated.They set out the reasons. The basis on which they exercised their discretion, quite apart from the lapse of time, was that Mr Bryan had had access to various advisers and had sought advice in these matters. It is obvious that all these matters have been looked into, in one way and another, by various courts. The allegation that the conduct of the police in these various cases, which I have mentioned, was plainly not in good faith, and that Mr Bryan was, in fact, innocent of what he was charged with, would of course have been directly decided by the criminal courts before which he appeared. He has since had plenty of time to consider appeals concerning those matters and, of course, bringing proceedings against either the police or his former employers or both, in which he could make these allegations of conspiracy.Those are all matters which it was perfectly proper for the Industrial Tribunal to have in mind, and they have set out those of them which they did have in mind; namely, the access to advice which Mr Bryan has had. They set out, quite rightly, what he has told us himself, that it was in 1992, he says, that he first became aware of these matters, giving some right, as he thought, to complain to the Industrial Tribunal, and it was not until the end of November, 1993, that he actually brought his complaint. All those matters they considered.We, of course, can only interfere with the exercise of discretion by the Industrial Tribunal if it was wrong as a matter of law; if the Tribunal took into account matters which they ought not to have done, or if they clearly exercised their discretion in a wholly irrational manner.The case is in our list today to see whether we can discover any such point of law. Mr Bryan has addressed us for about half an hour. He did in substance repeat the matters which are set out in his Notice of Appeal and documents attached to it. He told us again about the matters which the Industrial Tribunal found. He asks us to look into these matters for him. It is not a question of whether we want to look into these matters for him, it is a question whether we have to have any jurisdiction whatever to look into these matters. They are, of course, hopelessly out of date. But that is not the point.We can find no error of law or error of principle in the way this Industrial Tribunal arrived at its Decision. It appears to us that they have acted impeccably in inquiring into these matters and exercising their jurisdiction. It is therefore, as I say, for us to discover, with Mr Bryan's help of course, if there is any point of law on which this Appeal can proceed. If there is not, we shall simply be acting without any jurisdiction whatever in entertaining it, or anything that Mr Bryan has to say about it. Having considered the matter as carefully as we can, we cannot discover any point of law here, and therefore the matter can proceed no further, and we have to dismiss it at this stage; and we so order.