Mrs A Allen v Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust — 2017

Mrs A Allen worked for Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust and its predecessors from 23 November 1987 until dismissal on 22 May 2018. She had been a Band 5 Clinic Manager - Sexual Health Service, managing 19 staff and carrying out IT and data work. In late 2016 the Trust began a change-management exercise after a reduction in funding, and the tribunal found that by the 11 November 2016 staff meeting the claimant was effectively told in front of colleagues that her Band 5 role would go, although a formal at-risk decision was not made until January 2017. The tribunal considered that a private discussion would have been preferable, but held that redeployment could not properly begin before consultation had ended.

The tribunal found that the claimant never agreed to the Band 4 IT & Data Lead role to which the Trust later sought to move her. It held that the Trust nonetheless treated her as if she had taken that role, backdated the change to March 2017, reduced her pay and hours from Band 5/full-time to Band 4/18.75 hours, and recovered an alleged overpayment of £1,348.47. It also held that the claimant remained employed under her original Band 5 contract right through to dismissal and that the later notice pay was wrongly calculated at Band 4 rate.

On disability, the tribunal found that the claimant's anxiety and depression amounted to a disability from 12 January 2018. It rejected direct disability discrimination for the earlier events and rejected the respondent's capability basis for dismissal. The tribunal instead found that, by the time of dismissal, the real position was that the claimant's substantive Band 5 post no longer existed and the respondent was dealing with what was in substance a redundancy situation, so the dismissal was unfair and also amounted to discrimination arising from disability.

On age, the tribunal held that the February 2017 occupational health referral question asking about 'retirement due to ill health' was age-related and amounted to harassment related to age. It also found that the later grievance process failed properly to investigate that complaint and treated the claimant's grievance in a way that was also harassment related to age. Direct age discrimination was not ultimately upheld. The judgment's opening summary also records harassment related to disability as successful, although the reasons section is less explicit about a separate disability-specific harassment act.

The tribunal dismissed victimisation and the claim for failure to provide a written statement of main terms of employment, finding that the claimant had been given written terms during employment and that the Band 4 paperwork did not apply to her original contract. It upheld unauthorised deduction claims and, to the extent necessary, breach of contract because the respondent unilaterally reduced pay and hours, backdated the change, and paid notice at Band 4 rate. Remedy was left to a separate hearing, so this judgment records liability only and no final monetary award.