Mr N Levy v The Governing Body of Oaks Park High School — 2020

The claimant brought claims of direct race discrimination, race-related harassment, victimisation, constructive unfair dismissal and holiday pay. The tribunal rejected the bulk of the factual allegations said to show race discrimination. It found that the office move in September 2015, the removal of chairs, the absence of a formal appraisal, development plan or job description, the allocation of students, the management of leave and attendance, and the handling of the disciplinary process were explained by the school’s operational concerns and the claimant’s working style, not by race. It also rejected the alleged June 2016 remark by Mr Manning about black men and found the claimant’s evidence on the wider discrimination case to be neither credible nor coherent.

The tribunal did find that Mr Manning’s March 2017 comment to students that the claimant’s room looked like a youth club and made the school look untidy was unprofessional and humiliating, but it held that the comment arose from concerns about students gathering in the room without appointments and was not related to race. It also found that Mr Todd’s September 2017 email to about 14 or 15 colleagues, containing a reference to a “drug dealing Range Rover”, was unwanted conduct related to race and had the proscribed effect. However, that harassment complaint was presented out of time and, applying section 123 Equality Act 2010, the tribunal refused to extend time because the incident was a one-off, the claim was about six months late, and the claimant had already raised grievances and was contemplating litigation.

On the student A allegations, the tribunal found there was a proper basis for concern: student A had missed lesson time, the claimant had signed a mentoring card in a way that was not accurate, and there were inconsistencies between his account, the contemporaneous record and the CCTV evidence described in the disciplinary bundle. It held that there was reasonable and proper cause to require the claimant to refrain from work, to suspend him, and to investigate the matter as potential gross misconduct. The tribunal also found that Ms Hamill’s investigation was fair and that the refusal to investigate the claimant’s January and March 2018 grievances before the disciplinary process ended was justified by the overlap with the disciplinary issues and, in the case of the March grievance, by the tribunal’s finding that it was presented to stop the disciplinary process.

The constructive unfair dismissal claim failed because, taking the matters relied on cumulatively, the tribunal held that there was no fundamental breach of the implied term of trust and confidence and no effective cause of resignation. It found that the claimant resigned on 24 April 2018 on the eve of the disciplinary hearing he had tried unsuccessfully to prevent, rather than in response to a repudiatory breach by the respondent. No remedy was awarded, and the holiday pay claim had been withdrawn.