Miss E Meade v The Heyford School Trust — 2021

Miss Meade worked as a SENCO and Inclusion Lead on a fixed-term contract and was dismissed during probation. She said the dismissal was because she had made protected disclosures, including concerns about staff training, safeguarding, recruitment and SEN provision. The tribunal recorded the chronology of complaints, the probationary review process, the grievance and whistleblowing correspondence, and the later probationary meeting that resulted in dismissal.

The tribunal applied s.43B and s.43C ERA 1996, referred to Kilraine v London Borough of Wandsworth on the need for sufficient factual content and specificity, and accepted that most of the points in the claimant’s further and better particulars were too general to amount to protected disclosures. It found that a handover document and general complaints about staff training were not protected disclosures. However, it found that two table entries concerning individual children, including one child said to be under prosecution and another child identified as KJ, did disclose information capable of showing a possible failure to provide education in line with statutory duties, and that those disclosures were made in the public interest.

Even though those two matters were protected disclosures, the tribunal accepted Mrs Healey’s evidence that the reason for dismissal was the claimant’s lack of suitability for the post, as shown by complaints from staff and parents about communication, manner and responsiveness that had arisen before the whistleblowing referral. It found the Respondent had been considering the probationary review process independently of the disclosures, had given the claimant opportunities to attend meetings, and was not acting because she had raised protected concerns. The claim under s.103A ERA 1996 therefore failed and was dismissed. No monetary award was made.