Published Employment Tribunal figures for the year to April 2006 indicate a rising trend in claims with a total of 115,039 compared with 86,181 in the previous year.
Of the total, 50% were for unfair dismissal or breach of contract, particularly unlawful deduction of wages. Whilst awards for unfair dismissal are capped just short of £70,000, the average award last year was £8,679, up from £7,303 in 2005. Awards for discrimination, where there is no upper limit, were much higher averaging £10,800, £19,300 and £30,300 for sex, disability and race discrimination respectively.
It is therefore not surprising that a recent survey of 470 businesses concluded that employers increasingly view the tribunal system with suspicion and feel that they are biased towards trained lawyers! With now more than 70 individual types of claims employees can bring against employers, more and more multiple claims are being submitted to increase the likelihood of winning. If such claims are taken into account, the total number of claims last year increases to over 201,000.
These statistics add fuel to the Confederation of British Industry’s claim that the Dispute Resolution Regulations introduced in 2004 (click here) not only represented a further debilitating administrative burden for employers but have also added significantly to the number of vexatious claims.
The Tribunal Service, however, deny this to be the case and argue that the increase in claims is due to a high number of equal pay cases.