Miss L Green v Tim Parry Jonathan Ball Peace Foundation — 2022

Miss Green worked as a cleaner/domestic for the Peace Foundation from 1 October 2002 until she resigned with immediate effect on 28 April 2022. The tribunal accepted that the charity had experienced financial difficulty after the Covid lockdowns and had reduced its security spending from about £90,000 to £40,000 a year. It found that the change to security arrangements affected Miss Green because she had been working 3am to 6am shifts since a 2010 arrangement after maternity leave, but that arrangement had not become a contractual entitlement to staffed security during those hours.

The tribunal found that the respondent met with Miss Green in March 2022 and then repeatedly tried to retain her by offering options, including keeping her existing hours with a key, reverting to her original 6.30am to 9.30am hours, or later a 6am to 8am arrangement. When Miss Green raised safety concerns, the respondent offered a key, lone-worker arrangements, security call-backs, and other measures. The tribunal accepted that redundancy was not the real issue and that there was no contractual obligation to provide a security guard during her early shift. Applying the constructive dismissal authorities it cited, the tribunal held that the respondent's conduct did not amount to a fundamental breach of contract or breach of trust and confidence, so the constructive unfair dismissal claim failed.

On holiday pay, the tribunal preferred the respondent's evidence that the leave year ran from 1 April to 31 March and that the extra birthday day off was discretionary rather than contractual. It accepted that a Barclays payment record showed Miss Green received £71.25 on 18 May 2022 described as holiday pay, which the tribunal found covered the 2.5 days of accrued untaken leave due after her resignation. It therefore found no outstanding holiday pay due.