The EAT has handed down an important judgment concerning equal pay in the case of Bainbridge v. Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council (No. 3). The EAT upheld the decision of the Tribunal at first instance that employees whose jobs are found to be "rated as equivalent" to their comparators’ jobs under a valid job evaluation study cannot backdate their claims for 5 years as they could if their claim was for equal pay for like work or work of equal value.
The logic behind this ruling is quite clear – two jobs cannot be said to have been rated as equivalent under a job evaluation study in terms of the Equal Pay Act 1970 prior to the job evaluation study coming into effect. Conversely, there is no difficulty with finding that someone who is currently employed on like work or work of equal value to their comparators was so employed previously, assuming that the jobs had not changed.
The Hon. Mr Justice Elias (President of the EAT) did make clear, however, that a claimant in this position could still raise an equal value claim in respect of the period prior to implementation of the job evaluation study. Indeed the fact that jobs have been rated as equivalent under a job evaluation scheme will be evidence (albeit not conclusive) in an equal value claim that these jobs were in fact of equal value at an earlier stage, again assuming that the content of these jobs has not changed.
A further interesting point arose in this case concerning the statutory grievance procedures. As you will be aware, where a statutory grievance procedure applies to a complaint and an employer fails to comply with it, any compensation awarded must be increased by 10-50%, unless there are exceptional circumstances which would make an increase unjust or inequitable. In this case, the EAT ruled that owing to the employees’ inability to be able to reach a resolution with their employer, due to the nature of the conditional fee arrangements which the employees had entered into with their solicitor (which meant that if they had done so they risked potentially significant penalties under those arrangements), there were "exceptional circumstances" within the meaning of the legislation. Accordingly, no uplift in compensation was awarded in respect of the employer’s failure to hold individual grievance meetings.
Finally, the majority of the EAT found that claimants in these circumstances are not barred from lodging new claims for equal pay in respect of the same period as their original claim but citing a new and different comparator, irrespective of whether their original claim was successful.
Disclaimer
The material contained in this e-update is of the nature of general comment only and does not give advice on any particular matter. Recipients should not act on the basis of the information in this e-update without taking appropriate professional advice upon their own particular circumstances.
© MacRoberts 2007
