Case 1403097/2022 · Employment Tribunal
Mr S Flemming v 21 Six Limited — 2024
- Case reference
- 1403097/2022
- Decision date
- 28 August 2024
- Jurisdiction
- England & Wales
- Judge
- Employment Judge Midgley Representation
Parties
2 namedClaimant
Mr S Flemming
Respondent
Key findings
Tribunal's reasoningThe tribunal found that the employment relationship between Mr Flemming and 21 Six Limited did not end by mutual consent on 28 April 2022. It accepted that there were discussions on that date about the claimant leaving and about a share buy-out, but held that the critical terms were not settled, including the value of the shares and the termination date. The tribunal preferred the claimant's evidence that he was not told on 28 April that he had already resigned or that the employment had ended.
The tribunal found that the decisive dismissal occurred during the telephone call on 6 May 2022. It accepted the claimant's and Mrs Flemming's evidence that Mr Ankers said the claimant's position was untenable, his shares were worth nothing, and that if he did not accept the offer Mr Ankers would "go nuclear" and fire him. On that basis, the tribunal held that an objective listener would understand the exchange as an ultimatum to resign on the respondent's terms or be dismissed, which amounted to a dismissal within s.95 ERA 1996.
The respondent's case that it had a fair reason based on a mistaken belief in mutual termination was rejected. The tribunal held that the dismissal was not shown to fall within a fair reason under s.98 ERA 1996, and that dismissal for refusing to accept the proposed settlement terms was not justified. It therefore found the unfair dismissal claim well founded. It also held that the dismissal breached the claimant's notice entitlement and that the notice period was three months on the contract it considered likely applicable.
The tribunal further found that the claimant had not been provided with a written employment contract, so the claim under s.1 ERA 1996 for an award under s.38 EA 2002 succeeded. The judgment records that the disability discrimination claim mentioned in the claim form was withdrawn and dismissed on withdrawal by the claimant. The tribunal left the amount of compensation, including any issue of contributory conduct, to a later remedy hearing.
Claims and outcomes
4 findings recorded| Claim type | Issue or finding | Outcome | Protected characteristic | Award |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unfair dismissal | The tribunal found the claimant was dismissed by the respondent on 6 May 2022 and rejected the case that the employment had ended by mutual consent on 28 April 2022. | Upheld | — | — |
| Breach of contract | The claim for notice pay succeeded because the dismissal was held to be in breach of the claimant's contractual notice entitlement. | Upheld | — | — |
| Other | The claim under s.1 ERA 1996 for an award under s.38 EA 2002 succeeded; quantum was left to the remedy hearing. | Upheld | — | — |
| Disability discrimination | The judgment records that the disability discrimination claim was withdrawn and dismissed on withdrawal by the claimant. | Withdrawn | Disability | — |
Legal tests applied
10 references- Glynwed Distribution / who really ended the contract?
- Matthew Riley v Direct Line (termination by mutual consent)
- Omar v Epping Forest DC (reasonable listener)
- May and Butcher (agreement to agree)
- Jones v Mid-Glamorgan / Sandhu v Jan de Rijk (resignation vs dismissal)
- s.98 ERA 1996 / s.98(4) reasonableness
- Ely v YKK Fasteners (mutual mistake as SOSR)
- Willow Oak / band of reasonable responses
- Taylor v OCS Group Ltd (process as a whole)
- Nelson v BBC (contributory conduct)
Official outcome judgment PDF
Gov.uk primary recordThe official judgment PDF on gov.uk contains the tribunal's outcome, reasoning, and any remedy details. Where this page does not yet show extracted outcomes for every claim, use the PDF as the authoritative source.
Published on gov.uk under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
How we got this data
Case essentials (reference, date, judge, venue, country, claim categories) are extracted from the structured metadata gov.uk publishes alongside each decision. Parties and monetary figures are extracted from the judgment PDF text. Key findings and per-claim outcomes require a second extraction pass that is not yet complete for this case — until then, the primary source linked above is the authoritative record. See full methodology.
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