MARRIED WOMEN TEACHERS

TEST CASE. DISMISSALS UPHELD.

Judgment was delivered by Mr. Justice Eve, in the Chancery Division, in Price v. Rhondda District Council, a test case, brought for decision upon the validity of notices served by the defendants upon Mrs. Price and fifty-eight other school teachers in their employment, dismissing them on the ground that they are married women. Judgment for the defendants affirmed the validity of the notices. Mr. Justice Eve said Mrs. Price, sueing on behalf of herself and fifty-eight other married women, teachers now or lately employed by the educational committee of the Rhondda District Council, claimed a declaration that a notice dated July 24, 1922, purporting to terminate their engagements was invalid and not binding upon them, and also an injunction restraining the council from acting upon it. The defendants asserted that the engagements of all the plaintiffs were determined by a notice terminating on Oct. 31, 1922, which notice the plaintiffs pleaded was invalid, as not being in accordance with Regulation 75. They maintained that the contract of April 1, 1919, had been so modified in September and October, 1920, that the defendants had no power to determine engagements by notice under Regulation 75.

LONG ABSENCES.

For divers reasons, which included the fact that it frequently happened in the case of married teachers that they had to absent themselves from their duties for several months, and also the fact that the defendant Council, in common with educational authorities all through the country, had, for some time maintained a view adverse to the employment of married women as teachers. The Council, on Nov. 13, 1914, adopted a resolution passed by the Education Committee, terminating the services of all their certificated married women teachers at the end of five years (1919), provided that any such teachers who should not then have completed the minimum period of recorded, service entitling them to superannuation under the School Teachers Superannuation Act should be allowed to complete the period, and also terminating the services of unmarried uncertificated teachers in five years, with the same proviso. This resolution was communicated to all the teachers.

REVISED RESOLUTION.

When the five years expired, in November, 1919, the matter was reconsidered, and on Dec. 3, 1919, this resolution was varied by the Education Committee so as to terminate the engagements of married women certificated and uncertificated teachers, on July 31, 1920, with the proviso as to incompleted service to qualify for superannuation. The Council adopted this revised resolution, but substituted Aug. 31, 1920, for July 31, 1920, as the date of the termination of service. Notices of dismissal were served on Aug. 31 on those to whom it immediately applied, and Mr. Berry, the director of education, on Sept. 20, 1920, without getting any very express instructions, acquainted those not immediately affected with the terms of the resolution, and requested them to supply information so that he might ascertain that they would be affected. All the ladies replied by letter. It appeared that in many instances married teachers had been absent for six or nine months, and the question arose whether those periods should be calculated in ascertaining the qualifying periods for superannuation.

In consequence of the way in which that question had been answered it became necessary for Mr. Berry to communicate further with the ladies, and on Oct. 20, 1920, he sent out a circular which stated that these periods could not be regarded as affecting the time, and asking for particulars of absences, which were duly supplied. The plaintiffs contended that this document, and in particular that of Sept. 20,1920, constituted an offer to modify the terms of their agreement of service, and that each married woman who continued (and they all did) accepted the offer and turned it into a contract of employment on different terms to those which had subsisted down to that date – the difference being that as from the acceptance of that offer the engagement could not be put an end to under Regulation 75, but must continue down to the date at which the teacher had qualified for superannuation.

BINDING CONTRACT?

Was the letter of Sept. 20 an offer to each recipient to continue in the employment, binding the Council not to determine the employment before the date specified? In Mr. Justice Eve’s opinion it was impossible so to construe it. There was an absence of that which was a necessary foundation of a contract – an offer accepted. Even assuming it was an offer, was it an enforceable contract? Where was there any consideration, or its equivalent, mutuality? The plaintiffs maintained that while they still had the right to determine the employment on giving notice, the authority was bound to employ them down to a distant date, and could not determine the employment in the meantime. Further, it was obvious that Mr. Berry would, for the purpose of making an offer, purport to be acting as the authorised agent of the Council to make it. But on the whole the evidence showed that he was not so authorised. The fact that he had issued the document was wholly unknown to the committee until a long time after. So that even if it were an offer, it was not a contract, as Mr. Berry had no authority to enter into it. In his opinion there was no substance in the point that the engagement of these married ladies had been varied by what took place in September and October, 1920, and he must treat them as being in 1920 in the same position as they were in between April, 1919, and December, 1920.