United Management loses bid for judicial review
Published:Wednesday | April 13, 2022 | 12:07 AMMcPherse Thompson/Contributor
United Management Services, which has a contract for services with Jamaica’s toll collectors, has been denied leave to apply for judicial review to quash the decision of the Ministry of Labour to refer to the Industrial Disputes Tribunal (IDT) a row relating to the termination of one of its employees.
The former employee, Natasha Simpson, was employed to United Management Services under a fixed-term contract dated July 2011. The plug was pulled, with immediate effect, on her employment on January 16, 2012.
A three-member Court of Appeal panel comprising Justice Patrick Brooks, Justice Almarie Sinclair-Haynes, and Justice David Fraser last Friday dismissed an appeal brought by United Management Services and affirmed the decision of Supreme Court Justice Lennox Campbell, who on April 29, 2016, refused the application for leave for judicial review.
According to the Court of Appeal judgment, Justice Sinclair-Haynes, who wrote the decision, noted that after Simpson’s employment was terminated, Howard Duncan, an industrial relations consultant, requested that United Management reinstate the worker within five days.
That request was not granted, despite Duncan citing breaches of the rules of natural justice in a letter dated March 1, 2012.
Duncan consequently wrote to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security requesting its intervention.
A conciliatory meeting held on May 17, 2012, between Simpson and United Management was unsuccessful.
On July 23, 2012, Melisa Collash-Manahan, on behalf of the director of the IDT, told United Management’s attorneys that the tribunal had no alternative but to proceed with the matter in accordance with the Labour Relations and Industrial Disputes Act.
Three days later, United Management sought to invoke the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court by filing an application for leave to apply for judicial review by way of an order of certiorari to quash the decision of the Ministry of Labour to refer the dispute to the IDT.
It also sought an order of prohibition to prevent the IDT from exercising jurisdiction to hear the matter, as well as a stay of proceedings pending the hearing of the application for judicial review.
United Management suggested that the IDT had no jurisdiction to hear the dispute.
Justice Campbell heard the application for leave on September 5 and 11, 2012, and refused it on the grounds that the request “does not disclose that the applicant has an arguable case with a realistic prospect of success”.
However, the judge acceded to United Management’s request for permission to appeal that ruling.
The Court of Appeal ruled that the ministry’s referral of the dispute to the IDT was properly made and that Justice Campbell’s views on the appeal grounds could not be faulted.
In a unanimous decision, the Court of Appeal dismissed United Management’s appeal and affirmed Justice Campbell’s ruling.
Attorney Stephanie Williams, instructed by Henlin Gibson Henlin, represented United Management Services, while attorney Althea Jarrett represented the IDT and the Ministry of Labour.
Asked if United Management will now submit to the jurisdiction of the IDT, Williams said, “We are still reviewing the judgment and taking instructions.”