Job tribunal fees illegal

Gers

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40727400

Great news.

SeduLOUs

All well and good that fees paid will be refunded, but what about all of the people who couldn't afford to take their cases in the first place?

Mersey_2

I always thought they were unlawful - 'cos Graylng introduced them by stealth (via Statutory Instrument) ie there wasn't even a vote by MPs!


As with his book banning (also reversed), it's probably why Statist ex-SDP members like him should never be made Cabinet Ministers.

agrinnall

It is good news, but I've no doubt that the government will either appeal or reintroduce fees in a way that is less easy to challenge.

electic

The government cannot appeal against this decision as it was made by the Supreme Court, but yes - I think reintroducing them via primary legislation is likely.

bignred05

How does it work if you won your tribunal and the employer paid your fees as a result, will you still get this back

Crazy_Jamie

SeduLOUs wrote: »

All well and good that fees paid will be refunded, but what about all of the people who couldn't afford to take their cases in the first place?

That is currently the subject of some debate amongst lawyers. We'll find out more in the coming weeks. Two potential options have been primarily brought forward at the moment, namely either a claim against the government for unlawfully depriving a person of the chance to bring a claim, or claimants can bring their claims now anyway and claim that it wasn't reasonably practicable to do so beforehand because the fees prevented them from doing so. There are issues with both of those approaches, but they both represent interesting possibilities from a legal standpoint.

Crazy_Jamie

bignred05 wrote: »

How does it work if you won your tribunal and the employer paid your fees as a result, will you still get this back

No, because to receive a refund on your fees when your employer has already paid them to you would amount to your profiting from the situation. Your employer may well be able to claim that figure back from the government though, on the basis that they should never have had to pay it because you should never had had to pay it.

agrinnall

bignred05 wrote: »

How does it work if you won your tribunal and the employer paid your fees as a result, will you still get this back

Pay what back? If you didn't pay any fees there's nothing to get back is there? Whether the employer would have a claim against the government is something the lawyers will need to argue about.

bignred05

agrinnall wrote: »

Pay what back? If you didn't pay any fees there's nothing to get back is there? Whether the employer would have a claim against the government is something the lawyers will need to argue about.

I did pay the fees, but I won so the employer had to pay me the fees for daring to take them on shall we say.

Crazy_Jamie wrote: »

No, because to receive a refund on your fees when your employer has already paid them to you would amount to your profiting from the situation. Your employer may well be able to claim that figure back from the government though, on the basis that they should never have had to pay it because you should never had had to pay it.

Thanks, worth a try

How ironic when last year a former colleague was scared off going down the tribunal route when I advised him on the amount involved, even after I said you get it back if you win

TELLIT01

electic wrote: »

The government cannot appeal against this decision as it was made by the Supreme Court, but yes - I think reintroducing them via primary legislation is likely.

Can they even do it via primary legislation? It wasn't the way it was done which was deemed unlawful, it was virtually every element of it fell foul of one other law or another. The bit of the news I heard about it today even claimed that it was in breach of Magna Carta.