A short story based on real events, depicting the everyday work of an IWW Caseworker, and some salutary lessons. The characters described are fictitious and not intended to represent any person, living or dead.

A stench of impunity emanates from many of Britain’s employers. They have had their way so long they cannot even be bothered to familiarise themselves with the laws that are skewed in their favour. This leaves us a lot of ‘low hanging fruit’.

A Fellow Worker who we shall call Joanna was prompted to join the IWW after being bullied at work, which left her with anxiety and depression, relying on medication. Joanna speaks English as a second language; she took a job in another factory, Slakfitt Engineering, and worked there without incident for a year and a half.

One Friday, at the end of the day, Joanna was summoned to a disciplinary hearing first thing Monday morning. A disciplinary investigation had been conducted in her absence while she was on leave, without informing her of the allegations against her. We recommend that no employee ever attend such a meeting unaccompanied; when she arrived, Joanna was asked if she had a companion but protested she had not had time to find one. We doubt that even Unison or Unite could provide a rep at such short notice. Joanna was not offered a postponement or told that her job was at stake. After a brief exchange during which she was interrupted and browbeaten by Slakfitt’s Managing Director, Dave Wellard, she was summarily dismissed and sent home without notice.

By the time our representative, Wobbly Stan, was allocated to the case, it seemed the game was over, but our Stan is a tenacious little bugger and has been here before, many times. Examining the circumstances of Joanna’s sacking we concluded that the employer had made no attempt to follow ACAS guidelines, in its responsibility to conduct a fair and transparent disciplinary process, or to assess the needs and make Reasonable Adjustments for a vulnerable employee with Protected Characteristics under the Equalities Act 2010. ACAS guidelines are not legally binding, but Employment Tribunals take a dim view of employers who ignore them completely. In this case the company hadn’t even complied with its own procedures.

The rules say we must exhaust the employer’s internal process before taking further action, so Stan and Joanna attended a Disciplinary Appeal meeting which proved to be a box-ticking exercise on both sides.

Before considering a case, an Employment Tribunal will usually require the parties to go through Early Conciliation to see if the matter can be resolved through negotiation. Applying for EC sounds nice and fluffy but puts named individuals on notice that they may have to explain their conduct to a judge. Judges are not necessarily sympathetic to our Class but they do tend to know the law and don’t appreciate being made fools of.

We filled in the form claiming Unfair Dismissal and discrimination under EA10 section 9 (race, ethnicity and language) and section 6 (disability or recurring medical condition). Discrimination includes not only treating the employee differently, but failure to make Reasonable Adjustments where an employer knows, or ought to know, that they are disadvantaged by a Protected Characteristic.

The next step is for ACAS to assign a neutral conciliator who acts as a go-between. They are not allowed to take sides, offer advice or express an opinion on the merits of either position. Pete Blank called Stan who outlined our case, Joanna was simply asking for pay in lieu of notice as per her contract. He came back with Slakfitt’s view that she was only entitled to a week. Were they ready to settle then? When we established that she had been subject to a month’s notice, their corporate sphincter clenched shut and conciliation was declined, so Pete issued our EC certificate, allowing us to proceed to Tribunal.

Another form to fill in, not too different from the last and nowadays you can do it on line, in stages. There’s a character limit for describing your case and the machine can’t count, but don’t worry, there’s space to add more detail later on. The courts are all backing up so you have to wait a month or so. We received what might have been, on the face of it, a setback. They offered us a case-management hearing in nine month’s time. Would the FW stay the course? Many don’t, but Joanna was determined to make Slakfitt pay.

We were also told that a judge had moved to strike out Unfair Dismissal because Joanna didn’t have two years service. Stan wrote to the court explaining that we considered her dismissal Automatically Unfair because Slakfitt’s discriminatory conduct acted to her detriment, and that it was possible she had been selected for dismissal precisely because they doubted her ability to stand up for herself. He added that if the court ruled her dismissal was not unfair, we would pursue the discrimination claim anyway. Our best witness was the bosses’ own transcript of the Kafka-esque kangaroo court she was subjected to.

The rules require that all our correspondence with the court be copied to the other party. The last seemed to loosen the corporate constipation and a week later Slakfitt agreed to pay Joanna her entitlement. It’s usual for settlements to include a confidentiality agreement, which is why this story is actually about three other cases.

What lessons can we learn? Firstly, never give up – there is always a plan B, and a plan C; we won’t stop, anywhere, because at the end of the road is a boss with a singed arsehole and that’s worth any amount of trouble. Too many cases are lost because the FW simply can’t be arsed to take all the steps necessary to win. We owe it to our Class not to let the bosses get away with anything. Next, don’t be afraid of procedures and tribunals, the bosses have much to lose and will be shelling out a fortune on lawyers, while trying to avoid bad publicity. What’s more, anyone can do it; Wobbly Stan would be the first to admit he is nothing special, but you must be diligent – attend to the details, get the company name and address right, double-check everything. Solicitors are notoriously careless so if you involve them you’ll have to check their work as well.

We urge all Fellow Workers to familiarise themselves with employment law so far as it applies to their situation, starting with their own contract of employment. We’ve seen many cases where employees are asked to sign agreements that are unlawful and unenforceable. Take the rep’s training and read the manual. As a member you have a LRD login, so use it. When a rep goes into a meeting with employers they should know more about the relevant legislation than their opponents, and brief the FW to the same level, if necessary write a script for them and rehearse it.

The law is not our friend, “a conspiracy of the rich to oppress the poor” as Adam Smith put it. Nevertheless it is the terrain on which we operate, and whichever adversary best understands their relative orientation to the terrain weaponises it. Just as in a brawl you might hit your opponent with the door, bounce them off the wall and shove them into a ditch, you must understand the forces and balance points better than they do.

So make sure you’ve actually got a case! If you’re just pissed off with your boss there are better ways to deal with that. Collective action is always best, if there are enough Wobblies in one workplace they call the shots, right or wrong, and if they’re all rep trained so much the better, it can save a lot of form-filling.