Rosenblatt: Claim against law firm founder fails
The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has dismissed an appeal by a former Rosenblatt partner after his claim against the law firm was rejected.
His Honour Judge James Tayler decided that none of Noel Deans’ grounds of appeal raised arguable errors of law.
He held the preliminary hearing to determine whether Mr Deans should be permitted to amend his notice of appeal by adding substitute grounds, and whether there were arguable grounds of appeal that should proceed to a full hearing.
It followed a decision in September 2024 to reject Mr Deans’ claim of race discrimination, harassment, victimisation, constructive dismissal, unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal and making a protected disclosure against the City firm, senior partner Ian Rosenblatt, former chief executive Nicola Foulston, and partner and compliance officer Anthony Field.
Employment Judge Emma Burns was critical of Mr Deans, an employment lawyer, for making “serious, yet unsubstantiated” allegations during the original hearing.
Since then, that law firm has gone out of business, along with the listed group of which it was part, RBG Holdings, and the appeal was dropped against it as a result.
Mr Rosenblatt and Mr Field now work from a new firm, Rosenblatt Law, as senior partner and joint managing partner respectively.
HHJ Tayler was critical of Mr Deans’ failure to comply with the requirement in the EAT rules to assert a clear error of law in the heading to each ground of appeal. He said some of the seven grounds just sought to re-argue the case.
The ground that came “closest to being arguable” was that the tribunal erred in its approach, reasons and conclusions as to the victimisation claim.
This concerned Mr Rosenblatt, who is Jewish, accusing Mr Deans of being antisemitic.
HHJ Tayler said: “I can see a strong argument that to accuse someone of being racist is detrimental treatment, even where it is the expression of a genuine belief.
“It is also only necessary that the doing of the protected act is a material cause of the treatment. That could be the case even if the main reason for an allegation of antisemitism is genuine belief in its truth.
“However, the employment tribunal made a clear finding of fact: ‘Mr Rosenblatt did not act in retaliation against the claimant because he did a protected act but because he thought the claimant was being antisemitic.’”
HHJ Tayler said: “I have concluded that factual finding unarguably was open to the employment tribunal. It represented the conclusion of the employment tribunal as to the sole reason why Mr Rosenblatt made the allegation of antisemitism.”
The judge concluded that the tribunal delivered a “careful and detailed judgment” and reached determinations that were open to it.
“It is not the role of the EAT to second guess the employment tribunal’s fact finding. The EAT can only intervene if there is an error of law in the judgment of an employment tribunal. Arguable errors of law should be capable of being set out briefly. The appeal is dismissed.”
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