Miss L M Guy v London Borough of Hounslow and 1 other — 2019

Miss L M Guy resigned from her post as a Teaching Assistant on 19/12/2018 and claimed that the school’s conduct had destroyed mutual trust and confidence. The tribunal accepted that there had been a series of events after an allegation on 9/7/2018 that she had pushed a colleague and thrown a chair, but it found that the respondent’s decision to suspend her was reasonable, given the allegation of assault in a school setting and the possibility that pupils could have witnessed the incident.

The tribunal found that the school acted reasonably in the investigation and disciplinary process, including the timing of the invitation to hearing, the postponement caused by the claimant’s sickness absence and occupational health referral, and the rearrangement of the hearing for 13/11/2018. It held that the school had acted responsibly and reasonably once it became aware of the claimant’s health condition, and that the claimant had been offered representation and the opportunity to engage with the process.

The disciplinary panel issued a written warning on 16/11/2018 for inappropriate shouting at a junior colleague, which the tribunal recorded as serious misconduct under the School’s Code of Conduct. The claimant did not appeal that decision and did not raise a grievance. When she was invited to an absence management meeting on 12/12/2018, she did not attend; the school postponed the meeting, checked on her welfare through her sister, and later re-referred her to occupational health.

Applying the approach in Kaur v Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and the principles in Western Excavating, Malik, and Omilaju, the tribunal held that the invitation to the absence meeting was not a repudiatory breach and that the respondent’s conduct, viewed cumulatively, did not amount to a breach of contract. It found that the claimant resigned because she could not accept the disciplinary outcome and was dissatisfied with the absence process, not because the respondent had acted in a way that entitled her to resign. The claim was dismissed and the provisional remedy hearing was vacated.