Appeal No.	 PA/30/98

EMPLOYMENT APPEAL TRIBUNAL
58 VICTORIA EMBANKMENT, LONDON EC4Y 0DS

	At the Tribunal
	On 8 June 1998

Before
THE HONOURABLE MR JUSTICE MORISON (PRESIDENT)
(AS IN CHAMBERS)

MR L PARCHMENT	APPELLANT

FORD MOTOR CO LTD	RESPONDENTS

Transcript of Proceedings

JUDGMENT

APPEAL FROM THE REGISTRAR’S ORDER

Revised

	APPEARANCES

For the Appellant	NO APPEARANCE BY OR ON BEHALF OF THE APPELLANT	
For the Respondents	NO APPEARANCE BY OR ON BEHALF OF THE RESPONDENTS	

	MR JUSTICE MORISON (PRESIDENT):	This is an appeal against the decision of the Registrar contained in her order dated 26th February 1998. By her decision Mr Parchment’s application for an extension of time in which to file his Notice of Appeal was refused.

	Mr Parchment, I accept, is unwell and has been unwell for very many years. The nature of his illness does not need to be elaborated, it is sufficient to say that he is mentally troubled and is unable to work.

	The decision of the Industrial Tribunal was given on 13th October 1997 and sent to the parties on 3rd November 1997. It was their unanimous decision that Mr Parchment’s claim of racial discrimination was out of time and it would not be just and equitable for it continue. They found as a fact that Mr Parchment had been employed by the respondents, the Ford Motor Co Ltd, as a welder from 11th November 1974 to 6th April 1984, therefore, his complaint of racial discrimination was received some 13 years out of time. Having considered the case with care and the evidence of a medical nature presented to them, they concluded that there was a very substantial period of time in which Mr Parchment could physically have made his claim and that although they were sympathetic to his problems, there was no medical or other independent evidence to show that he had suffered from mental incapacity for 13 years whereby he was incapable of making a claim; and that it would not be just and equitable to require the Company to meet a claim after such a period of time, in particular, problems would be caused with the lack of written documentation and the fallibility of human memory over such a long period. That decision having been sent to the parties the appellant appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal but he was out of time. 

	The Registrar made enquiries of him as to why he was presenting his appeal out of time, and it would appear that he attributes his failure to the same explanation as to why he felt unable to present a complaint against his former employers within time. 

	Mr Parchment obviously has been suffering and still suffers from considerable disability, but he is not somebody who I should regard as being incapable of dealing with his own affairs in any technical sense. It seems to me that in the circumstances there is no satisfactory explanation for the delay in lodging his Notice of Appeal in this case. I am of the view that the Registrar’s order was correct and therefore I would dismiss this appeal, but I would like to add that if this appeal had come before us, on the basis of the material before me, I see no reason at all to believe that the decision under appeal of the Industrial Tribunal was other than manifestly correct in all the circumstances.