In person v Respondent — 2022

The claimant was employed by Kingswood Learning & Leisure Group Ltd from 5 November 2018 until 31 October 2020. She had less than two years' continuous employment and confirmed that the only complaint she pursued was automatic unfair dismissal under section 103A of the Employment Rights Act 1996. The respondent admitted that she had made protected disclosures to Sarah Farrell on 13 March 2020 and to Andy Marsden on 15 April 2020 about alleged conduct by Mike Husband towards female colleagues.

The tribunal found that the respondent's business was seriously affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, with residential trips not permitted, income reduced to zero for a period, and a monthly wage bill of approximately £1,000,000. Between June and October 2020 about 300 employees were made redundant. Mike Husband proposed changes in the Sales department, including combining the claimant's Head of Schools role and Jennifer Willows' Head of Groups role into a new Head of Sales, UK Groups & Schools role at £45,000, and creating a Sales Centre Manager role based in Norwich.

The tribunal found, on the balance of probabilities, that Mike Husband did not know about the claimant's protected disclosures when he developed the redundancy proposal or during the redundancy consultation process. It also found that although Stephen Watson knew of the disclosures, they did not motivate him to make the claimant redundant or influence Mike Husband to do so. The tribunal rejected the suggestion that there was an orchestrated campaign to remove the claimant from the business and found that this was not a Royal Mail Ltd v Jhuti situation.

The unanimous decision was that the claimant was dismissed by reason of redundancy, because her discrete Head of Schools role was no longer required in a redundancy situation falling within section 139 ERA 1996. The tribunal held that she was not dismissed because she made protected disclosures, so her complaint of automatic unfair dismissal under section 103A ERA 1996 failed and was dismissed. No remedy award was made.