Attorney General v Messi: EAT grants indefinite restriction of proceedings order against serial employment claimant

The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has granted an indefinite restriction of proceedings order against Ms Sandra Messi under section 33 of the Employment Tribunals Act 1996, following an application by His Majesty's Attorney General on the basis that Ms Messi is a vexatious litigant.

Since 2017, Ms Messi brought over 50 Employment Tribunal claims — 13 in 2024 alone — typically arising from unsuccessful job applications or short-lived engagements. Her claims commonly alleged race, sex and disability discrimination, whistleblowing detriment, victimisation, and unpaid wages. She also made a striking number of interim relief applications in whistleblowing proceedings, each of which was dismissed. None of her claims has succeeded, and there is no evidence that any settled.

Across multiple tribunal regions, Ms Messi's claims were variously struck out for having no reasonable prospect of success, dismissed following non-attendance, or withdrawn. Employment judges sitting in different centres consistently found that she failed to comply with directions, sought postponements without supporting evidence, avoided hearings, and made unsubstantiated allegations of dishonesty and document fabrication against employers and their representatives. In several instances, her conduct was characterised as an abuse of the tribunal process.

Legal framework

Section 33 of the ETA empowers the EAT to make a restriction of proceedings order where a person has habitually and persistently and without any reasonable ground instituted vexatious proceedings or made vexatious applications. The EAT drew on the established test in Attorney-General v Barker [2000] 1 FLR 759, in which Lord Bingham CJ described the hallmark of vexatious proceedings as having little or no basis in law, subjecting the defendant to inconvenience and expense out of all proportion to any likely gain, and constituting an abuse of the court process. Habitual and persistent conduct does not require obsession with a single opponent; it may be satisfied by repeated applications of a like type against different respondents, as confirmed in Attorney General v Roberts UKEAT/0058/05.

Once the statutory conditions are met, the EAT retains a discretion whether to make an order. That discretion requires a balance between a citizen's right of access to justice under Article 6 ECHR and the need to protect others — and the tribunal system — from abusive and ill-founded claims. Crucially, a restriction of proceedings order does not operate as an absolute bar; it functions as a judicial filter, requiring the EAT's permission before any further proceedings may be instituted.

Decision

The EAT found all three statutory conditions clearly satisfied. Ms Messi's allegations of apparent bias — arising from the Solicitor General's former professional association with a barrister involved in related proceedings — were rejected. The fair-minded and informed observer would not have perceived any real risk of bias. The allegation that the application was tainted by fraud, on account of the authorisation pre-dating the supporting affidavit, was also dismissed; no rule requires an affidavit to precede the authorisation it supports.

On the substance, the EAT agreed with the employment judge in Messi v Change Grow Live that the volume and pattern of Ms Messi's interim relief applications indicated a scheme rather than any genuine pursuit of justice. Her repeated failure to attend hearings, combined with a pattern of withdrawal and procedural obstruction, reinforced that conclusion. The EAT was satisfied that respondents had suffered substantial prejudice and that the tribunal system's finite resources had been unfairly diverted.

The order was granted for an indefinite duration. The EAT declined to extend it to preclude Ms Messi from acting as a McKenzie friend, finding no jurisdiction under section 33 to do so — the ETA lacks the equivalent wording found in section 42 of the Senior Courts Act 1981 — and no evidence that she had ever performed that role.

Any future claims by Ms Messi will require the prior permission of the EAT, which will only be granted where the proceedings are not an abuse of process and disclose reasonable grounds.

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