In the case of Ellard and others v Alliance Transport Technologies Ltd, the employer entered administration following financial difficulties and a failed attempt to secure further investment or a sale as a going concern. A total workforce of around 51 employees was affected.
Shortly after the administrators were appointed, 15 employees were dismissed as redundant. A further larger group of employees was dismissed a few days later after attempts to secure a sale proved unsuccessful.
Some employees succeeded in claims for a protective award on the basis that the employer had failed to comply with its collective consultation obligations. However, three employees who had been dismissed in the earlier tranche of redundancies were unsuccessful before the Employment Tribunal. The Tribunal concluded that, at the point of their dismissal, the employer was not proposing to dismiss 20 or more employees because efforts to sell the business were ongoing.
The claimants appealed.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal allowed the appeal and substituted a finding that the claimants were entitled to a protective award.
The EAT emphasised that the correct legal question is whether the employer was proposing to dismiss 20 or more employees within a 90-day period, not whether there was a single, fixed proposal at a particular point in time. The statutory language requires a forward-looking assessment of what dismissals are being contemplated over that period.
The Tribunal had...
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