An HGV driver who stopped working after announcing that he was “knocking off for Christmas” has been refused permission to appeal against the dismissal of his employment claims.
The driver worked for JB Groundworks Limited from May 2024 until January 2026 and brought claims for unlawful deduction from wages, breach of contract and constructive unfair dismissal.
All of Christian Berry’s claims were rejected by the Employment and Discrimination Tribunal in a judgment published this week.
The tribunal found that Mr Berry stopped work on 17 December 2025 after refusing a specific job and telling his employer he was “knocking off for Christmas”.
He had already exhausted his annual-leave allowance, meaning no holiday pay was due for the period. The tribunal also ruled that a two-day Christmas payment he had received the previous year was a discretionary bonus rather than a contractual entitlement.
Mr Berry sought permission to challenge the judgment in the Royal Court, advancing seven grounds of appeal.
These included allegations that the tribunal had mishandled questions about his training and certification for work beyond HGV driving, missing training records and timesheets, an alleged conversation with a former employer, and the condition of workplace welfare facilities.
But Deputy Chair Advocate Cyril Whelan rejected the application, finding that it largely challenged the tribunal’s assessment of the evidence rather than identifying an arguable error of law.
The original tribunal had found that Mr Berry’s contract permitted him to be given other work appropriate to his skills, with training where necessary.
It also heard that the company had drawn a “line of competence” and prevented him from carrying out more testing tasks involving plant and machinery.
The judgment noted that Mr Berry had sometimes voluntarily undertaken additional duties and had not complained about them at the time.
Advocate Whelan described him as “a man not slow to assert himself when he felt that he was being ‘put upon’”, but said he had made no contemporaneous objections about the tasks later raised in his claim.
The tribunal accepted that the toilets and washing facilities at the builders’ yard were “downright basic” and might arguably have fallen short of the employer’s welfare obligations.
However, Mr Berry had continued working under those conditions, meaning any potential breach had been accepted and could not support his constructive-dismissal claim.
“Expressed bluntly,” the judgment said, the tribunal had been unwilling to hear further repetitive evidence “about sinks and toilet seats” when the issue could not change the outcome.
It also rejected Mr Berry’s suggestion that he had been placed under time pressure, saying he had instead been told that he did not need to repeat the same points.
The tribunal concluded that none of his proposed grounds of appeal had a realistic prospect of success.
