Mrs P Smith v North West Ambulance Service Trust — 2025

Mrs P Smith was employed from 14 April 1998 as an Ambulance Care Assistant in the Patient Transfer Service. After her wife attacked an NWAS manager in November 2023, the claimant was arrested on allegations of harassment and threats to kill, suspended, and then taken through an SOSR process. The respondent relied on the seriousness of the arrest, the prior social media warning, alleged breakdown of trust and confidence, and possible reputational harm, and dismissed her on notice by letter dated 25 April 2024. The tribunal treated the dismissal as one for some other substantial reason under s.98(1)(b) ERA 1996 and considered fairness under s.98(4).

The tribunal found that the respondent had over-relied on the claimant's arrest and on untested suspicion about her knowledge of her wife's intentions. It held that the claimant had been passive in relation to the arrest, that the police took no further action against her and lifted her bail conditions in March 2024, and that the respondent had conflated an SOSR dismissal with uninvestigated conduct allegations. It also found that the respondent's stated reputational concerns were speculative and that the additional fact of the claimant's marriage to the perpetrator did not rationally add to the risk the respondent said it faced.

The tribunal attached weight to the unsent 22 April 2024 outcome letter and the timing of the final decision, which it found had been made by 22 April 2024, the first day of the wife's criminal trial. It considered the omission from the final 25 April letter of a paragraph suggesting the claimant might have known of her wife's intentions to be significant. On appeal, the panel took into account a Facebook post made by the claimant on 1 July 2024 after dismissal, but the tribunal held it was not reasonable to use that post to confirm the original dismissal, particularly as it was a reaction to the dismissal and was not fairly produced in the appeal process. The claim for unfair dismissal therefore succeeded. Remedy was not finally determined; the tribunal said the claimant's basic award appeared to be £14,036.55 and the compensatory award was subject to the statutory cap of £26,541.84, but invited the parties to narrow remedy issues or list a further hearing.