An issue which arises quite frequently in employment law practice is whether the Employment Tribunals in England & Wales have jurisdiction (i.e. are able to/are allowed to) hear cases from people who work outside the UK for some or all of their time. Classic examples of this are people who work in shipping, in the aviation industry, journalists and similar.
This is a particularly complex area of law and one which is very fact specific. It would be extremely dangerous to look at one case and compare it to your own, reaching the decision that you did have a right to bring a claim in England and Wales unless the facts – all of them – are absolutely on a par with yours. You need to take specialist advice.
In Cable_News_International_Inc_v_Ms_Saima_Bhatti__2025__EAT_63.pdf the Employment Appeal Tribunal considered whether a British born journalist of Pakistani heritage who was employed by a broadcast media organisation domiciled in the US state of Georgia could bring a claim in the Employment Tribunals of England & Wales.
The jurisdiction specified in Ms Bhatti’s contract was Georgia, USA. CNI Inc had a subsidiary based in London with whom she had dealings from time to time. For a period Ms Bhatti was based in Bangkok but from 2017 she was substantially working out of the UK and had moved her home to London, giving up her base in Bangkok. She only carried out one day of work per week in London before being told in August 2017 that her contract would not be renewed.
A first instance tribunal had (correctly) held that there was a sufficient connection to the UK from March 2017 based on Ms Bhatti’s moving her home to London and working one day per week from the company’s London base. This was in spite of the fact that her contract stipulated that Georgia USA was the legal jurisdiction her contract prescribed. Complex rules apply to this area of law where there is an international element. We shall gloss over those for the purposes of this blog!
By March 2018 the Claimant had no work responsibilities whatsoever in Asia; she was no longer based in Bangkok; neither was she based in Atlanta. London had become her only work location and therefore the tribunals had jurisdiction.CNI Inc appealed the decision. They disagreed. The Employment Appeal Tribunal however endorsed the decision of the first tribunal. Ms Bhatti had jurisdiction to bring her case in the employment tribunals of England & Wales. The first tribunal had correctly applied the closeconnection test in Lawson v Serco.
