1/ Rentplus UK v Coulson: Another HHJ Tayler judgment to keep in your "Essential case law" folder. Almost everything you need to know about the s.207A TULR(C)A uplift in 1 neat, concise judgment.
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/62907f52…
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2/ The case concerned a redundancy dismissal for a senior director. The ET found the redundancy process a sham, merely used as a vehicle for a dismissal decided on beforehand.
The ET awarded a 25% uplift for failures to comply with the ACAS Code.
The EAT upheld the uplift.
3/ HHJ Tayler provided lots of useful comments on the law on the uplift. First, a simple statement of the 4 stages of the s.207A test (though see Slade v Biggs for a 4-stage breakdown of the last question):
4/ 2ndly, a clear statement that in order to get an uplift for breach of the ACAS disciplinary process, it isn't necessary that misconduct or poor performance is found, merely that there's an issue of misconduct/poor performance the employer considers it must address.
5/ 3rdly, obiter disagreement with the ratio in Phoenix v Stockman (the 2016 version) that s.207A is inapplicable to an SoSR dismissal. The Stockman judgment survives for the moment (just), but the death knell has been sounded for the next case on which the EAT has to look at it.
6/ 4thly, the fact an ET finds there to be unlawful discrimination in the dismissal clearly does not take the case outside of the province of s.207A.
7/ 5thly, where an employer applies a procedure consistently with the code but does so in bad faith (for example, to effect a sham redundancy process), that does not amount to compliance with the Code and the s.207A uplift can apply.
8/ @42BR_Employment roommate @RadBarrister appeared for the employer & enabled the EAT to give this useful guidance.
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