Mr C Davies v DL Insurance Services plc & Others — 2018

Mr C Davies was an Area Manager and the respondent carried out a redundancy exercise in 2016 to reduce the number of Area Managers from four to three. The tribunal accepted that there was a redundancy situation, but found that the way the pool was formed was unfair. Christine Hutchin was taken out of the pool on geographical grounds, Chris Leech was later removed because he was acting up as National Manager, and the final comparison was left between Mr Davies and Matthew Lake.

The tribunal found that the eventual selection between Mr Davies and Mr Lake was not handled fairly or transparently. Mr Chiappino changed from the initially described criteria, used a number of largely subjective factors, decided who won each category without scoring the candidates, and relied on Mike Brown's comments without giving the men an opportunity to respond. It also found that the respondent did not follow its redundancy policy requirement to consult with ERB representatives and that the claimant was not given the scores at the consultation stage. For those reasons the unfair dismissal claim succeeded.

The direct sex discrimination claim failed. The tribunal accepted that Ms Hutchin had been excluded from the pool, but held that the reason was her geographical location and the structure of the reorganisation, not her sex. It found no facts from which it could conclude that sex was the reason for the difference in treatment, and said it reached the same conclusion as Employment Judge Horne had in relation to the deposit order. The case was listed for a later remedy hearing to deal with re-engagement, Polkey, the chance that Mr Davies would have been dismissed anyway, and any costs or deposit issues.