Mr Nokes had worked for the Hickleton Main Co Ltd until 4 June 1937, when the Chancery Court gave an order for the business to be transferred under the Companies Act 1929, section 154(1), on arrangements and reconstructions to Doncaster Amalgamated Collieries Ltd. Mr Nokes was absent and would be liable to pay damages to the new business under the Employers and Workmen Act 1875, section 4, if he had a service contract with the company, which he denied.

[1] Lord Atkin vigorously denied that Employers and Workmen Act 1875 could result in a fine for the worker and went so far as to say that he regarded any automatic transfer rule would be 'tainted with oppression and confiscation'.

I had fancied that ingrained in the personal status of a citizen under our laws was the right to choose for himself whom he would serve: and that this right of choice constituted the main difference between a servant and a serf...

The second is that it is a complete mistake in my experience to suppose that people, whether they are servants or landlords or authors do not attach importance to the identity of the particular company with which they deal.

The truth is that this argument was tried out and repelled over forty years ago by Stirling J in Griffith v Tower Publishing Co [1897] 1 Ch 21, where an author was held justified in refusing to allow his contract to be transferred to another company.