A FORMER teacher wasted over £120,000 of Kirklees Council money in a bitter and unsuccessful employment case.

Masood Khan, a former teacher at Newsome High School, stretched a five-day employment tribunal hearing into a costly ordeal which lasted four- and-a-half-years.

Khan, who has ulcerative colitis, said he had suffered racial and disability discrimination during his time at the school between 1993 and 2001.

He said such acts had culminated in an insulting speech by another teacher on his departure.

But Khan's claims were struck out in April last year by the tribunal in Manchester after he refused to go to hearings. He had asked for a fresh tribunal, saying his tribunal was biased.

Now an appeal against those findings has been dismissed by the Employment Appeal Tribunal. Presiding judge Anthony Ansell described the case as an `appalling state of affairs'.

In its decision Khan's tribunal slammed him as "the most obdurate, recalcitrant and openly contemptuous party that any of us have ever had to deal with".

The former teacher, who represented himself with help from his wife, squandered time and money by:

* Arriving significantly late on 24 of the 46 hearing days;

* Asking for an average six short breaks each days - to use the toilet

* Repeatedly refusing dates offered by the tribunal

* Cross-examining witnesses at inordinate length

* Refusing to accept guidance from the tribunal chairman

* Raising 80 objections to the conduct of the tribunal with more than 120 repetitious written objections.

* Accusing the chairman of insulting him.

A report from the tribunal said: "Mr Khan is by some distance the most obdurate, recalcitrant and openly contemptuous party that any of us have ever had to deal with.

"His stubborn refusal to accept any guidance or direction from the tribunal, and his repeated complaints and accusations of bias against the tribunal, were the cause of a substantial waste of tribunal time from more or less the outset of the hearing.

"Every effort of the chairman to bring some objectivity and proportionality to the claimant's presentation of his case, was rebuffed by the claimant, usually with an accusation of bias or some other complaint in relation to the conduct of the chairman or his lay colleagues, which then occupied even more time within the hearing."

A Kirklees spokesman said the council would be taking steps to recoup its legal costs.