Serial Litigants

Partners along with Damian McCarthy, barrister, have set up a simplified search service http://www.serial-litigants.com/ which is being challenged in the House of Commons by David Anderson MP. At the last count 37 MPs had backed the early day motion which suggests that the purpose of our serial litigant search service is a kind of ‘blacklist’ which might contravene the Data Protection Act.
 

 This is not at all the case; our service only determines whether a person has brought a series of similar unsuccessful claims previously. We do not keep a Database and at all times have been guided by the Information Commission Office.
 

 We are responding to this through the proper channels but the motion, put forward in January 10, is set out below and is inaccurate in some key respects. Our intention is to encourage Parliament to look at the true position; namely, whether serial litigants are a ‘significant problem’. At present nobody knows the true position because there is no access to the Register of Claims. Our suggestion is that the problem be correctly monitored and audited.

  

 

542

VICTIMISATION IN THE WORKPLACE

6:1:10

 

Mr David Anderson

 

* 1

 

 

   That this House recognises that people who are victimised in the workplace or treated unfairly in the recruitment process need to be able to challenge employers and seek redress; understands that a very small number of serial litigants are abusing this right for financial gain and condemns their actions; does not accept that these individuals are a big problem, and does not believe that measures designed to expose them should jeopardise the employment prospects of the vast majority of genuine victims; further condemns the launch of a website by Gordon Turner of Partners Employment Lawyers and Damian McCarthy from Cloisters Chambers which allows employers to find out if a person has taken an employer to tribunal in the past; believes that such a website could be used to screen unfairly applicants who have legitimately taken their employer to tribunal in the past, which runs contrary to the Government's progress on dealing with the victimisation of trade union members; is concerned that such a website would be in breach of data protection laws; and calls on the Information Commissioner's Office to investigate whether the website is compliant with the Data Protection Act.