Mrs F Mercer v Alternative Future Group Ltd and Mr Ian Pritchard: 2411052/2019
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 30 April 2020 |
| Citation | 2411052/2019 |
| Date | 30 April 2020 |
| Published date | 12 May 2020 |
| Court | Employment Tribunal |
| Subject Matter | Trade Union Membership |
Case No. 2411052/2019
Code V
1
EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNALS
Claimant:
Mrs F Mercer
Respondents:
1. Alternative Future Group Ltd
2. Mr Ian Pritchard
Heard at:
Manchester
On:
8 April 2020
Before:
Employment Judge Franey
(sitting alone)
REPRESENTATION:
Claimant: Mr S Brittenden, Counsel
Respondents: Mr P Edwards, Counsel
RESERVED JUDGMENT
AFTER PRELIMINARY HEARING
The “activities of an independent trade union” protected by section 146(1)(b) of the
Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 do not include
participation in lawful industrial action, and that part of the claimant’s complaint under
section 146 is dismissed.
REASONS
Introduction
1. This was a preliminary hearing held in public to determine a preliminary issue
under rule 53(1)(b).
2. The “Code V” in the heading indicates that this was a remote hearing by video
conference call by means of Skype. The parties and their representatives
consented to the hearing taking place in that way. In order to ensure that members
Case No. 2411052/2019
Code V
2
of the public had access to the hearing, it appeared on the daily cause list for
Manchester Employment Tribunal at Alexandra House, which remains open to the
public. I chaired the video hearing in one of the public hearing rooms in Alexandra
House, and arrangements were in place to enable any member of the public who
attended to view the video conference call. As it transpired, no members of the
public attended and the conference call was restricted to myself, counsel for each
side identified above, the respondents’ solicitor, Mr Campbell, and the first
respondent’s People Manager, Ms Forshaw.
3. In the remainder of these reasons I will refer to the Trade Union and Labour
Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 as “TULRCA”, to the European Convention on
Human Rights as “the Convention”, to the European Court of Human Rights as “the
ECHR”, and to the Human Rights Act 1998 as “the HRA”.
4. As this issue did not involve the second respondent, Mr Pritchard, I will refer
to the first respondent simply as “the respondent”.
Case Summary
Factual Summary
5. It was agreed that for the purposes of this Judgment I should assume that the
facts asserted by the claimant in her claim form would be proven at trial. I made no
findings of fact and nothing in these reasons should be construed in that way. This
summary is intended only to put the legal issue into context.
6. The respondent is a health and social care charity providing a range of care
services across the North West. It employs over 2,500 staff. The claimant has
been employed as a support worker by the respondent since 2009. At the relevant
time she was a workplace representative for her trade union, Unison.
7. In early 2019 there was a trade dispute regarding payments for sleep-in shifts.
Having gone through the balloting and notification requirements contained in Part 5
of TULRCA, the union called a series of strikes which ran intermittently between 2
March and 14 May 2019. There was no attempt by the respondent to seek an
injunction preventing that industrial action taking place.
8. The claimant was involved in planning and organising the strikes. In that
capacity she was interviewed by an online publication (“iNews”) in January 2019,
and some press material appeared in the Liverpool Echo in late March 2019. She
also intended to participate in the strikes herself.
9. On 26 March 2019 the claimant was suspended. The respondent told her it
was because of allegations that she had abandoned her shift on two separate
occasions without permission, and that she had spoken to the press about the strike
action without prior authorisation in way which conveyed confidential information and
was considered likely to bring the organisation into disrepute.
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