Veitch Penny LLP - Exeter | Crediton, Devon

Case

R v Governing Body of Woodthorpe Primary School, ex parte Derek Dorling (2002). Venue - QBD Administrative Court (14/11/02)

Issues

(1) Contracts of Employment
(2) Ill Health - capacity to teach
(3) Termination of employment
(4) Termination by operation of the law

Facts

This was an application by a teacher for declaration obliging the Defendant to terminate his Contract of Employment under Regulation 7 of Education (Teachers Qualifications and Health Standards) England Regulations 1999.

The Applicant had become ill in 1999 and did not have the fitness mentally and physically to continue teaching. In December 2001 he brought a private action for a breach of Contract by the Defendant on the basis that under Regulation 7 (I) of the Regulation they were obliged to dismiss him and failure to do so amounted to a breach of his Contract of Employment. The Applicant argued that the Defendant was obliged to dismiss him and that he was entitled to the dismissal notice period, payments and pension and that Parliament would not have intended to withdraw the statutory protection relating to unfair dismissal from a person in the Applicant's position.

The Defendant argued that as the Applicant did not have the capacity to continue in employment that employment had, as a matter of the operation of law, automatically come to and end and that within the wording of the regulation there was a bar to the Applicant's continued employment.

Decision

It was held that the 1999 Regulations had to be considered as a whole. If after investigation the Local Authority had concluded that the teacher no longer had the capacity to continue teaching then Parliament must have intended, that if he did not resign, he would be dismissed. It could not have meant that following the investigation and an adverse decision by the employer that the employment would come to an end. The Regulations required the Local Authority to be pro active and the Applicants Contract of Employment was not, by operation of law, brought to an end. The Regulations clearly imposed an obligation on the Defendant to dismiss the Applicant.

Comments

This case shows the need for those working for Local Authorities to carefully examine their own regulations to check on dismissal procedures that may be available to employees in different areas and the obligations imposed by regulations to formally dismiss them rather than to assume that the contract of employment will simply come to an end.