Miss H Salih v Mytime Active Heard at Ashford — 2024

The claimant, a long-serving employee whose employment had TUPE transferred to Mytime Active in around 2004, was made redundant in 2020 from her Apprentice and Volunteer Manager role within the HR team. The tribunal found her dismissal was unfair, having identified concerns with the consistency and fairness of the redundancy and redeployment process, including the strict application of a 58% job-matching threshold to her post while another colleague (Ms Carroll) was retained in a new role without a job match or interview and a trainee role was effectively created with another individual in mind. The tribunal considered that the breakdown in trust contributed to the claimant withdrawing her application for an alternative HR Advisor role.

On the direct age discrimination claim under s.120(1) Equality Act 2010, the tribunal dismissed the complaint. The claimant herself clarified that she did not consider age per se to be the reason for her treatment but rather her enhanced pension contributions, and she expressly opted not to pursue an indirect discrimination claim. The tribunal also found that pension was not in fact the reason for the treatment, and noted that her pension status had previously operated in her favour in an earlier redundancy exercise.

Remedy for the unfair dismissal claim was reserved to a separate remedy hearing, at which the tribunal indicated it would consider the chances that the claimant might have been successful in obtaining a suitable alternative role and the possibility of salary flexibility, as well as whether she would have remained in any such role indefinitely.