Miss A E Rudnik v Midshires Care Limited — 2024

Miss A E Rudnik worked for Midshires Care Limited in care roles and later as a Care Co-ordinator at Gateshead. After a final written warning in November 2021 for communication issues, the relationship with her line manager, Ms Amanda Birdsall, deteriorated further in 2022. She was suspended on 7 December 2022, invited to a disciplinary hearing on 12 January 2023, summarily dismissed for gross misconduct on 17 January 2023, and her appeal was rejected by Ms Amanda Stewart on 3 February 2023.

The tribunal upheld unfair dismissal because it found the investigation, disciplinary hearing and appeal were all unreasonable. It held that the investigating officer, Ms Michelle Dutton, had prior involvement with the claimant and prior knowledge of the earlier warning and grievance, that material documents including Ms Birdsall's grievance and grievance outcome were not disclosed, and that the disciplinary invite did not set out the allegations with sufficient specificity. It also found that Mr Nathan Duran conducted a hearing lasting about an hour, refused to look at documents the claimant brought, made no specific findings on the five allegations, and appeared to have pre-judged the outcome. The appeal did not cure those defects, and the tribunal noted that no one considered whether the matter should have been dealt with under capability rather than misconduct.

The wrongful dismissal claim succeeded because the tribunal did not find conduct amounting to a fundamental breach that would justify summary dismissal, so notice pay was due, although no remedy figure was determined in this judgment. The race discrimination claims under sections 13 and 26 of the Equality Act 2010 were dismissed: the tribunal rejected many allegations, found some comments or incidents were not proved or were too minor, and held that others were not sufficiently related to race or did not create the required hostile environment. The victimisation claim also failed because the claimant's complaints and emails did not amount to protected acts under section 27. The tribunal nevertheless found the claimant's conduct blameworthy and said that any compensatory award for unfair dismissal would be reduced by 60%, including on a no-difference analysis under section 123(6) ERA 1996.