Mr A Ghaffar v Age UK Calderdale and Halifax — 2019

The claimant received redundancy notice on 30 January 2018 after the respondent lost a Calderdale CCG grant worth £180,000 and began reducing the information and advice service. The tribunal found there was a genuine redundancy situation and that the service would continue in a reduced form, but it also found that the redundancy process was mishandled: the sickness absence scoring was applied incorrectly, the claimant was not given a proper breakdown of the score he received, and the initial information and consultation materials did not clearly explain how the reduced service and hours would work.

On the whistleblowing allegation, the tribunal examined the claimant’s conversations with trustee Mr Hillyard in August and September 2017 and later communications during the redundancy process. It found that the August discussion was limited to concerns about recruitment policies and did not of itself amount to information tending to show a criminal offence. The September discussion included an allegation that Mr Cromack had misused charitable funding and concerns about recruitment and promotion practices, but the tribunal held that the facts known to the claimant pointed to poor recruitment practice and possible nepotism rather than misuse of funds or other criminal wrongdoing.

The tribunal was not satisfied that the claimant had made the more serious disclosure he later alleged to Mrs Butland on 12 March 2018. It noted inconsistencies between the claim form, particulars and evidence, and preferred Mrs Butland’s contemporaneous note. It also found that the decision-makers dealing with the redundancy did not know of any protected disclosure and that the appeal panel dismissed the appeal because it considered the scoring exercise, not because of whistleblowing.

Applying section 98(4) ERA 1996 and the redundancy guidance in Williams v Compair Maxam Ltd, together with the Polkey approach, the tribunal held that the dismissal was unfair for procedural reasons but that there was a redundancy situation and no finding of a pretext to remove the claimant for whistleblowing. It concluded that, had a fair procedure been followed, there was an 80% chance the claimant would have remained employed on a 25-hour-per-week contract. No monetary award was quantified in the text provided.