Mr K. Wise v Travis Perkins plc — 2020

The tribunal found that senior management held the claimant responsible for poor results and stock losses at the Mold store before a full investigation and without considering mitigating circumstances. It also found that the claimant was given insufficient time to decide between performance management and demotion, but that he had accepted the demotion and waived any breach arising from it as a standalone matter.

The actionable breaches were found to have arisen from August 2018 onwards. These included excluding the claimant from the stock-loss investigation while involving his successor, giving him the choice of resignation or disciplinary action, suspending him where others had not been treated similarly for comparable or more serious matters, and sharing his draft grievance and disciplinary statement with managers named in the grievance without his consent.

The tribunal found that the grievance and appeal process did not resolve the claimant's complaints and was affected by the involvement of managers who were the subject of those complaints in appointing the officers. It concluded that the respondent's conduct cumulatively seriously damaged or destroyed the relationship of trust and confidence, that the claimant resigned in response to those breaches, and that the resulting constructive dismissal was not fair.