Newsflash: Launch of online tribunal decisions

A free access website of Employment Tribunal decisions has been set up by the Ministry of Justice, available here.

To date there are decisions available already from 2017 and also going back to 2015, with more to be added.  There is a helpful search function for use by name, date, judge or jurisdiction code.

This is a useful tool for both HR practitioners and employment lawyers as, although Tribunals are not legally obliged to follow the decisions of other Tribunals (unlike EAT decisions), they do provide useful examples of how Tribunals approach legal issues and factual situations.

Easily accessible Tribunal decisions may also act as an incentive for parties to settle their disputes, rather than face the potential bad publicity of a Tribunal defeat or revealing witness evidence published online and readily accessible via a Google search!

Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) decisions and Court of Appeal decisions are already currently available via the EAT online service, the Courts and Tribunals Judiciary’s online service and the British and Irish Legal Information Institute (BAILII).