The Claimant, a GP, brought a claim against the Respondent seeking compensation for leave taken on an unpaid basis in the period from 2011 until 2020, compensation for accrued but untaken entitlement to paid annual leave carried over from year to year, and a declaration of his entitlement to future paid leave. That claim was brought under § 230 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (“ERA”); Regulation 2 of the Working Time Regulations 1998 (“WTR”), and the EU Directive 2003/88/EC on working time (WTD). His claim depended on whether or not he was a ‘worker’ in terms of any or all of the foregoing legislative provisions. The Claimant was a partner with another doctor and the partnership had a contract (the GMS contract) to provide services to the Health Board. The ET concluded that the Claimant was not a worker in terms of any of the provisions relied upon. There was no contract at all between the Claimant and the Respondent. Both as a matter of form and also in reality, the 2018 GMS contract was between the partnership and the Respondent Health Board, not between the Claimant personally and the Respondent Health Board. The Claimant appealed.

The EAT dismissed the appeal. The judgment of the ET, that the Claimant was not the Respondent’s worker for the purposes of section 230 ERA, regulation 2 WTR or the WTD was one that was permissibly open to it on the facts which it found established. There was no error of law in the approach of the ET to these questions.