Wiluszynski v Tower Hamlets [1989] IRLR 259 (CA)

• Plaintiffs were LA estate officers, whose duties included (as a small part of their overall work) answering the questions of elected councillors. As part of a dispute the union ordered Plaintiffs not to answer councillors’ questions.

• LA refused to pay Plaintiffs’ wages as long as they refused to answer the questions put to them.

• CA held that since Plaintiff was acting in breach of his contract, Defendant was entitled not to pay him

  • (even though he was only breaching a small part of his contractual duties, and yet the LA were refusing to pay him for any of his work! However there may be a justification based on the dicta from Miles – see above).

Fox LJ

• Based on the dicta of Lords Templeman and Brightman in Miles v Wakefield he concludes that if the employee is unwilling to perform the whole of his contract the employer can tell him not to attend work and does not have to pay him (unless he accepts partial performance, in which case the employee will get partial pay).

• If he does attend work, he does so voluntarily and is not entitled to a quantum meruit claim. 

RELATED CASES

• Miles v Wakefield