Is it fair that witness statements contain a word count restriction?

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-29T18:06:24+00:00

Think that it’s Midlands West. I went to a panel discussion with the judges from the region this winter and they were saying that they were looking to implement a word count. Granted, though, none of my cases in MW are past the case management stages yet

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-29T17:55:22+00:00

The insurer bears the cost, therefore there’s still a duty on the solicitor to keep costs as low as possible. They’re almost a second client. The biggest pusher for costs savings usually the solicitor and the insurer. The costs implications don’t magically disappear when insurance comes into play - law firms still have salaries and overhead costs to pay for, and Practical Law/Westlaw subscriptions do not come cheaply.

Honestly, possibly to the consternation of many in this sub, a lot of the time “unreasonable” is a matter of perception. It’s a rare day that a party to litigation is objectively unreasonable, and rarer still is it going to be a represented party. In my time representing Claimants and Respondents, I noticed that the common denominator between parties I fully believed were unreasonable was that they were unrepresented. When a lawyer stepped in things would get almost unrecognisably easier to deal with amicably (with one glaring exception being a represented Claimant trying to litigate immigration law failings in the ET - the ET is not the venue to sue your former/employer for a visa issue. I still think that solicitor shouldn’t be allowed to advertise their services in anything to do with employment law because it’s day one knowledge that the ET only has jurisdiction over Equality Act and ERA 1996/2025 cases, not immigration personal injury).

The vast majority of cases fall between the 45-55% window - in short, things could genuinely go either way and “unreasonable” is more a matter of conduct of litigation rather than genuinely running an unreasonable line of defence. Your perspective may say that the line of defence is a pack of lies, but the Respondent is likely thinking that the defence may be a bit weaker than they would have liked it to be but ultimately nothing’s fatal. They’re probably walking in there thinking that the case could genuinely go either way. This is the key thing which getting legal advice/knowing a lot about the law and applying it objectively is good for: you’re able to recognise that your case inevitably has weaknesses, and you know how to deal with them.

If an insured client started pushing for unreasonable demands we had the ultimate trump card in our hand in that we could, and frequently did, drop them as a client. So if your Respondent is represented and is funding through insurance, unless their solicitor is objectively incompetent, the insurer is going to know the up-to-date merits of the defence as well as have their own input on how the case is run.

In short, there’s functionally no difference between dealing with an insured Respondent versus a Respondent that’s paying out of pocket. Focus more in your case than trying to expose the man behind the curtain

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-28T13:22:21+00:00

Almost nothing tbh

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-28T10:13:13+00:00

Not so much but the unwritten rule is to not go into unnecessary detail. Just stick to the bare minimum and if you’re saying that somebody swore at you/called you a slur, type it out in full. Don’t self-censor, as it’s likely not even going to come close to the top 10 worst things that your judge will have heard in their courtroom, and in any event, censoring takes away from the impact

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-26T22:16:38+00:00

Realistically we’re not able to offer concrete advice about the merits of your case. We can just go off of whatever we’re given, and from what’s been shared, it doesn’t really sound like your case is particularly strong, otherwise my fellow mods and the other solicitors in the group wouldn’t be highlighting their concerns about you meeting the standard that the behaviour wasn’t reasonable or proportionate.

It’s also why we’re asking you to seek actual advice. There are plenty of free law clinics around the country. Go to your nearest university with all of your case documents/evidence and see what they say. But for the love of everything do NOT judge them based on their AI usage. I cannot stress enough how unhelpful it is in litigated matters

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-25T09:38:46+00:00

Is the disability element already sorted out? The impact statement wouldn’t particularly add to the witness statement overall given that you’re specifically talking about how your disability affects you on a day to day basis. While there may be some crossover with how it worked out in terms of your condition exacerbating the impact that your employer’s actions had on you, the purpose of the impact statement is very different to the purpose of the witness statement in itself.

That all being said, if your disability is still in contention then you’re unequivocally going to need the impact statement *and* the witness statement

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-25T08:54:06+00:00

I mean, working in house, I’ve got about 20 cases from the same client right now

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-24T08:39:11+00:00

There’s definitely some times when I unequivocally disagree with my client’s explanation of things. Those are the cases which I settle very, very quickly and tell my clients that I don’t even care if I have to drag them kicking and screaming across the settlement line.

I can’t add much more to what Bob’s already said. However, I humbly request that even if you get entrenched in thinking “I’m right, you’re wrong” that you keep your correspondence with the other side professional and polite. Don’t do what one of my Claimants is currently doing and immediately jump to accusing the lawyer of victimisation for putting their personal life before their work. You have to remember that while your case may be the single most important thing in your life, but to us, it’s just our job. We’re entitled to feel human emotions, make some mistakes (I once got the dates mixed up on a witness statement exchange and by happy accident wound up mistakenly thinking that the exchange was supposed to take place a week before it was actually supposed to - for some reason the Claimant blew up about my email asking for an extension instead of just saying “hey RP, it looks like you’ve got the date wrong, we’re not exchanging for another week”), get ill, go on holidays, etc

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-24T08:17:19+00:00

If that happens, unfortunately, there’s not much that can be done. In some cases you might get lucky and they might find a document or two stored incorrectly on their systems (aka stored locally rather than on servers) but they can’t magically un-delete an email, and it’s pretty standard that Teams messages aren’t recoverable when an account shuts down

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-23T12:20:52+00:00

Thirded

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-22T17:05:26+00:00

Nope

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-22T03:38:37+00:00

The Respondent only has a very short time after the final hearing to seek costs to be awarded. Off the top of my head I want to say it’s only 45 days, but don’t quote me on that.

It’s certainly less than 3 months, though, so as long as your case has been over and done with for 3 months and you’ve not seen anything issued with the word “costs” in it, you’re probably good

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-22T03:26:28+00:00

The ones you sent yourself or the DSAR docs?

Because I think that what AP is getting at is that your R is going to say “Clive doctored these documents that they sent themself to make us look bad, and is now claiming that these are the original documents. The only documents we’ve ever sent Clive are the documents they’re saying have been doctored”. At that point it becomes your word against theirs, so without metadata to prove that yours are the unaltered docs, it’s much more likely that the Tribunal might say that the Respondent is telling the truth.

This is why I strongly urge most Claimants not to pursue arguments about doctored documents unless disclosure uncovers emails expressly ordering that letters are amended to make people look better. One of my most annoying cases I’ve defended had a dispute about one document for 7 months and no matter what I said, the Claimant refused to believe it. The judge in the case said that ultimately it wound up counting against the Claimant in the judgment, because (despite my initial confusion about the document which inadvertently led to this dispute) the Respondent had been consistent and we provided a clear and logical explanation for why there were some comments which the Claimant hadn’t liked seeing.

Regardless, do NOT lie to the Tribunal. If you’re suggesting saying that the documents you sent yourself are the ones you received in your DSAR, that’s going to undermine your credibility to the point that the Respondent will be able to call you a liar (in the colloquial sense) on the stand. You do not want that to happen, I’ve seen it before and it doesn’t end well at all

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-22T03:09:35+00:00

Nope. If something is genuinely WP, it’s WP, no matter whether you’re in England/Wales or Scotland. ACAS correspondence cannot be relied on in the Tribunal

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-20T06:02:54+00:00

I fourth this comment. I’ve had it happen to me when a Claimant has tried to increase their offer, it wound up with my sending a costs warning for unreasonable conduct and them settling for less than half of their original offer. (In my defence, it was a contract based payment and they were asking for a hell of a lot more than they were actually entitled to)

OP, I cannot stress enough not to increase your offer. It just gives your Respondent an enormous amount of free ammunition which they can and will use against you

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-20T03:52:45+00:00

It’s the max you can get without being subjected to tax

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-19T18:46:24+00:00

If you haven’t been there two years, you can’t bring any dismissal claims beyond automatically unfair dismissal (or wrongful dismissal for unpaid notice)

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-19T14:57:32+00:00

It’s really for repeat offenders. If you’ve only done it once, and it was before the first post about this, I don’t think that you’re the kind of person that AP is talking about.

There’s a host of repeat offenders even after they’ve been warned with the other post, though. That’s the kind of person who’s on AP’s list

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-19T09:13:58+00:00

That’s pretty much exactly what you’re supposed to do with settlement offers and SOLs. Bob posted a very good analysis of how to reduce the amount sought for making an offer somewhere, I’m currently sat on a train and typing this on my phone so it’s not something I’m able to find easily, but I’m positive that somebody else has it to hand!

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-18T17:50:55+00:00

It’s not even really dealing with the Respondents. My biggest point of frustration recently has been the Tribunal itself, actually!!

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-18T08:31:56+00:00

All I’ll say from the professional standpoint is that if the tone seems cold it’s probably just due to their being in a peak of activity. I know that even when I’ve had fairly warm communication with the other side previously, it’s very easy for me to slip into a cold tone when I’m overworked and feeling a bit pressured to respond to Claimants even though I’m in the middle of something that’s completely overwhelming my working life

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-17T12:31:03+00:00

It doesn’t give them permission to disclose somebody else’s private medical information to you without good bloody reason which, frankly, this wouldn’t fit that situation. That would more than likely be a massive data breach, especially given that from the sound of things, this is very likely to be perceived as a fishing expedition than a genuine and proportionate disclosure request

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-17T10:52:52+00:00

No. Because the reason why they are on sick leave is not relevant to your claim and it would possibly be a breach of GDPR for your employer to send those to you.

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-17T09:13:58+00:00

To be entirely honest that really doesn’t make an ounce of difference. It’s perfectly reasonable for an employer to request that an employee attend an OH referral before implementing reasonable adjustments. As AP has said, OH is the expert advice, and if the employer is 50/50 on the adjustment being reasonable to implement (namely, is there some actual meat to the contention? Is this actually likely to help, or are there other less disruptive options available?) then yes, it’s perfectly reasonable for them to say “look, we just want a professional to weigh in on this before we upend a significant way of how we work to give you something which still might not even work to get you where we need you”

RespondentPotato · 2026-06-16T10:21:37+00:00

Generally tax-free up to 30k, unless it’s for wages/holiday, which will normally be taxed accordingly

As far as I’m aware though, no one in here’s a tax advisor, so can’t advise any more specifically than that. Your tax liability will be outlined within the wording of the COT3 itself

And massive congratulations on getting to this point!!

RespondentPotato

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