Mr T Nicol v World Travel and Tourism Council and 2 others — 2024

The claimant, Mr Nicol, brought an automatic unfair dismissal claim under s103A ERA 1996 and detriment claims under s47B ERA 1996, and later withdrew a s100(1)(c) claim. The tribunal accepted that PD1 and PD2, sent by WhatsApp on 12 and 14 June 2019, were protected disclosures. It rejected PD3 on the facts, found PD4 did not amount to a disclosure of information, accepted that PD5 was a disclosure of information reasonably believed to be in the public interest, and held that PD6 was too broad and unspecific to amount to a protected disclosure.

On the dismissal issue, the tribunal found that the second respondent decided to dismiss the claimant by late August 2019 after learning of Ms Magoja's allegations of sexual harassment, after the Easyjet matter was raised, and after the claimant's 2 September letter proposing a consultancy arrangement and an ex gratia payment of £40,000. Although it found the purported redundancy process was not genuine, it held that the reason for dismissal was not whistleblowing. The tribunal found the respondents treated the claimant's references to whistleblowing as part of a negotiating strategy rather than the reason for termination.

On detriment, the tribunal held that the protected disclosures did not materially influence the respondents' actions. It found that the June WhatsApp messages did not register as protected disclosures in the second respondent's mind, that PD5 was not communicated to the second respondent with sufficient detail to put her on notice of a protected disclosure, and that the DSAR delays were explained by the size of the requests, the small size of the organisation, and the workload faced by the new third respondent. The claimant's allegations about the redundancy process and appeal did not alter the outcome because the tribunal found no protected disclosure causation.

No monetary award was made.