Mr D Howells, counsel For the v Respondent — 2019

The consolidated hearing concerned Mrs Khan and Miss Ali. The sexual-orientation claims were withdrawn. For Mrs Khan, the tribunal rejected the whistleblowing detriment and automatic unfair dismissal claims because the cash-in-hand conversations on 5 and 7 June 2018 were not sufficiently specific disclosures, and because the evidence showed the dismissal decision had already been made by 5 June 2018.

The tribunal nevertheless upheld one victimisation claim for Mrs Khan. It found that the 2 July 2018 response threatening to raise her husband's alleged tax avoidance in tribunal proceedings was done because of her protected act in the pre-action correspondence, which included allegations about protected disclosure and sex-equality/pay issues. The remainder of the victimisation allegations were dismissed.

For Miss Ali, the tribunal accepted the 7 May 2018 touching and the 6 June 2018 incident in which ZS held her arms/wrists and made the strip-show remark. It found sexual harassment and harassment related to sex, but dismissed direct sex discrimination, including the argument based on the 29 January 2018 'luv ya' text. The direct sex discrimination claims failed because the conduct was not treated as less favourable treatment.

On religion, the tribunal found that Mr Mohammed Hussein snr's 11 July 2018 remarks linked Wahabism with extremism and terrorism and amounted to harassment related to religion. It held that AY Trading was liable because he was acting as its agent, and it also found that AH's 12 July WhatsApp message and the handling of the 24 July meeting were harassment related to religion. The parallel direct race and religion discrimination claims were dismissed because the tribunal treated the successful complaints as harassment rather than direct discrimination.

Miss Ali was found to have resigned in response to a repudiatory breach of contract, with the cumulative treatment, the complaint handling and the later wage error all contributing. The tribunal found an unauthorised deduction of £250 from her wages and held that both claimants were entitled under reg.14 WTR 1998 to payment for accrued but untaken leave in the 2018 leave year; it did not finally quantify that holiday-pay sum in this judgment. The written reasons also recorded that the earlier oral 4-week award for failure to provide a statement of particulars appeared to have been made under a mistake of law and would be revisited at the later remedies hearing. The employer's contract claim was rejected under rule 12 for lack of jurisdiction.