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Journalists’ body hits out over cost of tribunals

A journalists’ union has hit out at the increased costs of employment tribunals after official figures showed a sharp drop in the number of people using them.

Ministry of Justice figures showed the number of applications to tribunals down 70pc since the introduction of fees for claimants.

The figures bear out warnings made prior to the change by the Chartered Institute of Journalists.

Amanda Brodie, chairman of the Institute’s professional practices board said: “We warned that charging would have the effect of putting off genuine claimants, and of introducing a justice system which would be used only by those who can afford to pay, and sadly we have been proved right.”

“The Government predicted a fall-off of between 25-40 per cent in tribunal applications but it has come out at nearly twice that figure.

“No doubt many employers will see this as good news but the truth is, it shows that too many people are being denied access to justice because they simply cannot risk losing out financially.”

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  • September 23, 2014 at 9:41 am
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    The Chartered Institute of Journalists is not a union. It’s not affiliated to the Trades Union Congress, and has a history of undermining struggles by real trades unionists for better pay and conditions for journalists. I’d be interested to know how many members it has – a few hundred at most I’d guess. The National Union of Journalists is the union for journalists.

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  • September 23, 2014 at 6:00 pm
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    For Peter Lazenby’s information, the Professional Practices Board of the CIoJ is the part of the Institute which deals with trade union matters and, functioning as the IoJ (TU) is a fully-fledged trade union in its own right. It is not necessary for any trade union to be affiliated to the TUC.
    We have an enviable record of representing our members both individually in the workplace and of campaigning on wider issues which affect journalists, of which this tribunals issue is just one. We gave evidence to the Government consultation on this issue, and it is one of many we have taken up on behalf of both our members, and of the wider journalistic community.
    We are a non party-political organisation because we feel we can best represent the interests of our members by leaving party politics out of our activities, including those carried out by our trade union arm.
    As for our membership levels, we are not as big an organisation as some, but we punch well above our weight in terms of the hard work put in to both support our members and to campaign on wider issues.
    Amanda Brodie
    Chairman, Professional Practices Board (IoJ TU)
    Chartered Institute of Journalists

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