Mr O Alimi v ENI International Resources Ltd — 2022

Mr O Alimi had been employed by ENI International Resources Ltd since 2014 and was on assignment in South Korea from September 2019. The tribunal accepted that the South Korean project was reduced and then closed because of COVID-related cost cutting, and that the claimant's assignment was terminated on 30 June 2020. It found that the later redundancy process, including consultation meetings in May 2020 and then again in January, March and April 2021, was conducted fairly and that the dismissal effective 7 July 2021 was a genuine redundancy. The dismissal letter said he would receive a statutory redundancy payment of £4,080, but no tribunal award was made because the unfair dismissal claim failed.

The direct race discrimination claims were rejected. The tribunal found the claimant had not proved that he was required to do both a Technical Safety role and an HSE officer role without extra pay, and it did not accept that the evidence showed a race-based reason for the unassigning decision, the work-from-home dispute, or the refusal to fund his son's return travel. It also found the comparators relied upon were materially different, including differences in employer entity, role and line management, and it did not find facts from which race discrimination could properly be inferred in relation to the unassigning or dismissal.

The disability discrimination complaint, including the s.15 allegations and the reasonable-adjustments complaint, failed because the claimant did not prove that he was disabled at the relevant times or that the respondent had the necessary knowledge then. The tribunal found that the claimant's account of informing management on 21 May 2020 did not establish knowledge of a disability, that the email of 26 May 2020 suggested a six-week recovery period rather than a long-term impairment, and that the later long-term disability pay decision did not establish earlier knowledge. It also found no proven PCP requiring him to work on site in the relevant period and no proven request to work from home between 16 and 26 May 2020.

The victimisation complaint also failed. The tribunal accepted the claimant had done protected acts by raising a grievance on 23 June 2020 and then through his solicitor's letter on 23 July 2020, but it found the first alleged detriment pre-dated those acts, the allegation about ignored emails was not supported by evidence of the emails concerned, and Ms Barnes's 7 August 2020 email was not shown to be a detriment or to have been significantly influenced by the protected acts. The €3,000 breach-of-contract claim about his son's ticket was withdrawn, and the €8,000 Las Vegas flight claim failed because the tribunal held the contractual approval discretion was exercised rationally. The wages complaint was left stayed pending 5 May 2022, with the parties having agreed that £622.84 net had been paid into the Utmost Fund contrary to the claimant's instructions; no final liability finding on that point was made in this judgment.