Hi, I am currently representing my daughter on the McKenzie friend basis in her claim for unfair dismissal on the grounds of discrimination ( pregancy ) We have followed all the procedures through ACAS and we are currently taking her employer through the Employment Tribunal, which has taking about seven months to get to a Trial which has been listed for next week 4/5th February 2016, this was after a previous hearing. Today i receive a letter from the Tribunal stating that the trial might be postponed on the grounds that despite knowing for a number of months that in any event, the trial would be considered by a panel rather than a single judge because it is a discrimination case, to use this as a reason, and so late in the day does not add up, they would have known months in advance that a panel would need to be assigned, so in using this has delayed even further. The Tribunal are also aware that the Respondents are in abuse of process as they have failed to abide the previous order for them to provide a trial bundle, witness statements and further and better particulars in readiness for the trial next week? Because of this we made an application for the Tribunal to make an unless order for this evidence to be giving as all of it is central to the claim and it had been previously ordered. We have also written to the other side and in anticipating the Tribunal not making the unless order, which seems very reasonable, by stating that we would provide our own trial bundle and giving them seven days to object. Since all of this has happened in the last couple of days, the Tribunal as it would appear are bending over backwards in allowing the previous orders be breached and ignored and they have also giving the Respondents more time to defend a claim that evidently cannot be defended because of the circumstances which led to my daughter being dismissed. Whilst i am not legally qualified as to adjudge it would a appear that (a) she has been denied the right to a fair hearing because her opponents have abused orders which if followed would have allowed the trial to proceed and ( b) the Tribunal could have not only made the request for that evidence to be disclosed, in postponing the trial next week, giving those facts and the excuse of needing a panel, which would have been knowledge as soon as pleadings were made, i feel this is unequal and unfair as the Tribunal are not only allowing orders to be breached, they are also giving the Respondents more time to further breach the orders. My daughter i feel has a very strong case and my theory is that because of the strength of her case, the opponents and the tribunal are doing everything in their power to keep this matter out of court. It is hard enough and most times financially impossible for pregnant woman to establish unfair dismissal claims because they are pregnant, the Tribunal who should protect, if my experiences are anything to go on make it even more difficult by allowing employers the right to ignore orders and as in this case give further encouragement for this to happen again by postponing without reason or justification. Any help would be greatly appreciated by this angry dad:mad2: