Mrs Gifty Poku v Barts NHS Trust — 2019

Mrs Gifty Poku was dismissed by Barts NHS Trust on 12 November 2019 for alleged misconduct. The tribunal accepted that the Trust genuinely believed she had committed misconduct and that the dismissal decision was taken by Mr Brice and later upheld on appeal by Mr Boa. The issue was whether that belief was based on reasonable grounds and whether dismissal fell within the band of reasonable responses under section 98 ERA 1996.

The tribunal found that the disciplinary process relied on two investigations. It accepted that the Claimant had previously received a written warning after the first investigation, but it found that several of the matters treated as misconduct were not reasonably capable of supporting dismissal. In particular, it found that the Trust had mischaracterised disputes about language, management style, and workplace interaction as insubordination or misconduct. It held that a delay of a few seconds in entering Ms Lee's office, and the Claimant's failure to follow a new and formalised one-to-one arrangement exactly as instructed, did not amount to reasonable grounds for dismissal.

The tribunal also rejected the disciplinary panel's conclusions about the April 2019 interaction with Tasneema Chowdhury and the statement made to Bosede Babalola about previous white managers. It found that the Claimant was trying to deal with intercultural communication difficulties, that no reasonable employer would have treated those matters as misconduct justifying dismissal, and that the Trust's approach to references to race was too absolute. Even taking the earlier written warning into account, the tribunal found that dismissal was outside the band of reasonable responses and that any sanction more serious than a final written warning would have been unreasonable.

The tribunal therefore held that the Claimant was unfairly dismissed. It did not determine compensation in this judgment. Instead, it ordered that the case be listed for a later remedy hearing and directed the parties to exchange a new schedule of loss and further remedy evidence, including evidence of income, mitigation, and any case for reinstatement or re-engagement.