Jess Varnish case could drag into 2019

Jess Varnish’s legal action against British Cycling and UK Sport could well drag on into next year, Cycling Weekly can reveal.

The track sprinter is suing British Cycling for unfair dismissal and sex discrimination after she was dropped from the governing body’s Olympic Podium Programme in April 2016, just months ahead of the Rio Olympics.

Varnish took legal action last summer and a ruling in November allowed her case to go forward.

CW understands the case was scheduled for a hearing at an employment tribunal in Manchester in April but the case has had to be postponed because key witnesses are set to be working at the Commonwealth Games in Australia.

However, the tribunal system is currently extremely busy following a Supreme Court ruling in July last year that fees of up to £1,000 for bringing cases to tribunal were unconstitutional.

That means it is taking many months to find time for cases to be heard.

Max Winthrop, head of the employment law committee at solicitors body the Law Society, said cases dropped 70 per cent when fees were introduced and so the number of judges and staff to deal with them decreased substantially too.

He said: “When fees were abolished, and held to be unlawful in the first place, it meant all those that had to cough up a fee were entitled to it back and cases that were struck off for non-payment of fees were reinstated. Then there were new cases from people who were wavering.”

He added: “There’s a great big backlog. When fees were going you would seek an application and they would say, ‘When do you want? How about next Tuesday?’ Now it’s, ‘Come back at the end of the year or 2019.’”

Varnish, British Cycling and UK Sport declined to comment.