Canterbury Environment Company

Case Summary

Mr Barlow and 32 other claimants brought a holiday pay claim against Canterbury Environment Company, alleging they were not receiving statutory holiday entitlement. The claimants failed repeatedly to comply with a tribunal order requiring each claimant to provide specific information about their claims by deadlines of 17 June, 4 July, and eventually 17 October 2025. At a preliminary hearing on 30 October 2025, the tribunal found the claimants had engaged in unreasonable conduct and non-compliance with tribunal orders, and ordered them to pay 50% of the respondent's solicitor costs and 100% of counsel costs.

The tribunal found that the claimants had engaged in unreasonable conduct and non-compliance with a tribunal order requiring each of the 33 claimants to provide specific further and better particulars regarding their holiday pay claims. Despite multiple deadlines and warnings, the claimants' representative provided only partial information for one claimant and later provided loss of earnings information without complying with the core particularisation order. The tribunal found this breached rule 74(3) of the Employment Tribunal Rules 2013 (breach of a tribunal order) and engaged rule 74(2)(a) (unreasonable conduct), meeting the threshold for costs.

• •Non-compliance with tribunal order for further and better particulars regarding holiday pay claims
• •Unreasonable conduct in repeatedly failing to provide ordered information for each claimant
• •Whether to award costs for conduct at preliminary hearing

The full source document is available from the official publication page.