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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal >> Fairweather v Channel Aluminium Ltd [1993] UKEAT 112_92_2511 (25 November 1993) URL: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/1993/112_92_2511.html Cite as: [1993] UKEAT 112_92_2511 |
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At the Tribunal
Before
HIS HONOUR JUDGE B HARGROVE OBE QC
MR R H PHIPPS
MR G H WRIGHT MBE
Transcript of Proceedings
JUDGMENT
Revised
APPEARANCES
For the Appellant MR HINTON
(Representative)
Hailsham Citizens' Advice Bureau
Southview
Western Road
Hailsham
East Sussex
BN27 3DN
For the Respondents NO ATTENDANCE OR
REPRESENTATION BY RESPONDENTS
JUDGE B HARGROVE OBE QC: On the 25th November 1991 the Brighton Industrial Tribunal held that the Appellant had been dismissed by reason of conduct and that such dismissal was not unfair.
The Appellant was a fitter/installer from May 1989 to July 1991 with the Respondents who manufacture and fit windows, doors and double glazing. The Company was a small one with some 55 employees of whom six were fitter/installers. It seems that Mr Bedford who runs the business, being the founder, gave all the fitters, including the Appellant, an oral warning on the 11th March 1991 because the quality of the work they were doing had deteriorated and gave rise to a large number of call backs, that is the work force was being obliged to return to site to rectify poor workmanship.
By the 28th June following close monitoring of the work Mr Fairweather received a written warning regarded as standard, of his work and his attitude. On the 12th July he was dismissed with a week's notice. The Tribunal considered each of the items about which the Respondent claimed. In one case the Tribunal found the work done was not acceptable to the customer or the agent. In two cases the job was carried out in a way which was not workmanlike and in one case the windows being fitted with the wrong size and in the wrong style. Not surprisingly the Tribunal found as a fact that Mr Bedford was seriously and genuinely concerned about the standard of work and that such concern was justified. There was a lack of formality about the dismissal, there is no appeal, the procedure for an appeal which obtained was to a Director but as the Appellant was sacked by the Managing Director the matter therefore seems not to have been investigated any further. Nonetheless the Industrial Tribunal found that the decision to dismiss came within the band of reasonable responses.
The format of the appeal is to take each of the items, where the Industrial Tribunal held that the Appellant was at fault, and to take items of fact indicating that there was another approach. For example, the first item which it is alleged that no warning was given and therefore there was no need for the Appellant to answer the matters at the time.
In each of the other three occasions the Tribunal has clearly accepted the evidence put forward on behalf of the Respondent. Quite understandably Mr Fairweather has a feeling of grievance because we have been told, although it forms no part of the appeal, that another employee who had been scheduled to bring his proceedings prior to this had in fact postponed his proceedings thereafter, and he, upon very similar grounds, was found to have been unfairly dismissed. But the short point here is that all the matters which are put before us are matters of fact. Unless a finding of fact is perverse it does not come within our jurisdiction, our jurisdiction deals only with matters of law.
The Notes of the Chairman show that most careful attention was paid by all members of the Tribunal to the evidence, they saw the witnesses and the conclusions of fact to which the Tribunal came seems to us, upon the evidence, to be decisions which they were entitled to make. There is no element of perversity here and accordingly this appeal fails.