Miss Stephanie Davies v The Chief Constable of Cheshire Police — 2022

By majority, the tribunal held that Miss Davies made a qualifying protected disclosure to DSI Blackwell on 12 September 2018 when she sent him her 2018 Report and photographs. The majority found that she reasonably believed the information disclosed tended to show a criminal offence had been committed or a miscarriage of justice had taken place, bringing the disclosure within section 43B(1)(a) and (c) Employment Rights Act 1996 and section 43C as a disclosure to her employer. Mr Clarke dissented, taking the view that the claimant was not reasonable in that belief.

Unanimously, the tribunal held that the claimant's other disclosures to other persons were not protected disclosures. Those were treated as disclosures of exceptionally serious failures under section 43H, but the tribunal found that, in all the circumstances of the case, it was not reasonable for her to make those disclosures under section 43G. The judgment records that the case would proceed to final hearing on the public interest disclosure detriment claims under section 47B Employment Rights Act 1996 and disability discrimination claims under sections 20/21 and 27 Equality Act 2010.