By way of an update, there have been two recent pieces of news concerning employment tribunals and the changes that came into force last year. Firstly, in connection employment tribunal fees, Unison has been granted permission to appeal the failed judicial review of employment tribunal fees.

Further, question time from the House of Commons has revealed that last year, in the period during which remission of fees was operative, only 24% of applications for remission of fees were successful in full or part. The Ministry of Justice originally predicted in its impact assessment that 31% of applicants would be entitled remission of fees. However, statistically last year this applied to only 9.5% of applicants to the employment tribunal. This may be useful ammunition for Unison in their appeal against employment tribunal fees if the Government don’t review the matter first. [Thanks to Daniel Barnett for bring the remission statistics to my attention]

Secondly, the High Court has dismissed the judicial review application made by Compromise Agreements Limited in connection with the maximum compensatory award an employment tribunal can make being capped to one year. They argued that this new cap disproportionately affected older applicants as they were the most likely to receive an award in excess of one year’s salary.