A group of Latin American seasonal migrant workers have succeeded in their challenge to a UK tribunal decision dismissing their exploitation claim over missing the three-month filing window.

The claim – brought by 88 workers and supported by trade union United Voices of the World (UVW) – alleges treatment that amounted to modern slavery during the migrants’ time at Herefordshire farmer and one of the UK’s largest berry producers, Haygrove. 

Poor treatment cited by the workers include unpaid wages, racial discrimination, being offered fewer hours than promised, and mounting debt accrued from rent and living costs. The group were recruited in Chile and came to the UK under the government’s Seasonal Worker Visa scheme.

An employment tribunal (ET) threw out their legal action last year, after finding that the group had failed to meet the three-month deadline for bringing a claim. Tribunals can extend the time limit in cases where it is “just and equitable” to do so.

A UVW spokesperson tells IEL that the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) found that the lower court had failed to consider the claim’s merits and the public interest in the arguments being put forward. They add that the appeal tribunal found the claim would not prejudice Haygrove’s ability to identify and introduce evidence. 

“Whilst the application of this discretion is the exception rather than the norm, the basis for the discretion itself is very wide, and the ET can take into account anything which it judges to be relevant,” Nick Hurley at Charles Russell Speechlys tells IEL. 

“The Court of Appeal has previously noted that even in cases where the EAT has grave doubts about the tribunal’s decision to strike out a claim on the basis of missing the strict three-month time limit, it must proceed with great care and only interfere when an overwhelming case is made out,” Hurley says.   

He adds that while the publication of the EAT’s judgment is pending, the decision suggests that it found the employment tribunal’s decision to be “perverse or wrong at law”. 

Haygrove now has 28 days to respond to the appeal. 

The claimants say they were overpromised pay and hours, while arriving to no work in their first week in the UK and were expected to reimburse the company for their flights.

The UVW first brought the claim on the workers behalf in 2023, after the workers had organised the first ever wild cat strike by seasonal migrant workers on visas in the UK. 

Workers under the Seasonal Worker Visa scheme are tied to one employer and are banned from seeking alternative work. Their visas were revoked following the strike. 

“The temporary worker visa programme needs more opportunities, including the right for workers to switch employers so that those being exploited can seek better conditions. Workers should also have access to unions to learn and protect their rights,” one of the claimants, Aida Luna Silvestre, said. 

“The reality of modern slavery is often ignored. People do not see the main issue: how workers are treated on farms and what rights they are entitled to.”

The workers challenged the tribunal’s decision in October, arguing that enforcing the rigid time limit in this instance denied vulnerable migrants, who had been made homeless and undocumented, redress. 

“Businesses who are working with potentially vulnerable individuals should certainly take note of this case and appreciate that tribunals may well apply a very wide discretion if tribunal deadlines are missed,” Hurley says. 

“However, this was an unusual case involving particularly vulnerable individuals, as well as a potentially high-profile state-backed visa scheme and accusations of modern slavery. The three-month deadline is likely to continue to be applied strictly in the vast majority of cases, with only decisions with regards to time-limits only likely to be overturned in exceptional circumstances.” 

The UVW General Secretary Petros Elia said: “This case exposes a brutal truth: migrant seasonal workers are not just exploited by individual employers like Haygrove, but by a system deliberately designed to make exploitation possible and unaccountable. 

“When workers are tied to a single employer, plunged into debt, stripped of income and immigration status, and then denied justice because they miss an arbitrary deadline while homeless and traumatised, that is not an accident — it is how the system works.”

The UK’s new Employment Rights Act, passed into law in December, has now extended the window for submitting a claim to employment tribunals to six months. The change will come into effect from October.

IEL approached Haygrove for comment. The farm has previously denied any wrongdoing and said it would defend itself against the claims.