Thomas Salwey was employed as Security Guard at the estate of one of the UKs richest men, Felix Dennis who has an estimated fortune of £500 million.He was allegedly dismissed for failing to complete a number of tasks associated with his job, including: failing to give water to the estates chickens; not watering the lawn; not washing up cups after himself; reading magazines. rather than working; damaging a vehicle by driving too fast.
Mr Salwey claimed that he had been unfairly dismissed and that his former boss had fabricated evidence against him.
The Birmingham Employment Tribunal dismissed his claim and ordered him to pay £1,000 costs to Mr Dennis. Mr Salwey allegedly called the Judge "vindictive", told her to “do her worst” and the stormed out of the Tribunal.
Costs in the Tribunal are still the exception rather than the nore, unlike in Civil Court cases, but as a number of high profile decisions show, Judges are becomming more inlcined to award costs against Claimants whose claims are vexatious, misconcieved or have no prosepcts of success.