Employment status: Agency worker was not client company's employee

The EAT holds in Esso Petroleum Co Ltd v (1) Jarvis and others (2) Brentvine Ltd 18.1.02 0831/00 that an employment tribunal which expressly found that there was no contract, either written or oral, between a client company and a worker supplied to it by an employment agency, erred in law in going on to rule that the existence of factors consistent with a contract of employment subsisting, and the fact that the worker had worked continuously for the client company for nine years, made her an employee of the client company. The only finding open to the tribunal in the circumstances described was that it was not possible in law for there to be an employment relationship.