In person For the v Respondent — 2019

The claimant worked for the respondent as a lettings coordinator from 14 August 2017 until 6 October 2017. The dispute concerned fire risk assessment forms for the respondent's offices. The claimant said she was not trained or competent to complete the forms and relied on a sequence of emails and a telephone conversation as protected disclosures. The tribunal heard evidence from the claimant and from Mr Mark von Grundherr and reviewed the email chain and the relevant fire risk assessment materials.

The tribunal found that the email sequence showed only that the claimant did not feel competent to assess fire risks and thought someone else should complete the work. It accepted that she did not at any stage tell the respondent that it was wrong for her to be asked to complete the forms, that she had been wrongly asked to do so for the Beaufort Park office, or that requiring her to do the work was putting anyone's safety at risk. On that basis, the tribunal held that nothing in the emails amounted to a qualifying disclosure under section 43B ERA 1996.

The tribunal also considered the claimant's account that she told Mr von Grundherr on 6 October 2017 that she was not comfortable completing the forms in case something happened, such as a fire and later scrutiny of the form. Even if that evidence were accepted, the tribunal said it would still amount only to an expression that she did not feel able to do the task reliably, rather than a disclosure tending to show that health or safety was likely to be endangered. The automatic unfair dismissal claim under section 103A ERA 1996 was therefore struck out under rule 37(1)(a) of the Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013.

The breach of contract claim was separate. By the hearing, the claimant accepted that she had been paid all contractual entitlements and withdrew that claim. The tribunal therefore recorded it as dismissed on withdrawal. No monetary remedy was awarded.