Miss Bradbury, Counsel. For the First v Respondent — 2020

The tribunal stayed the claims against the first respondent because Advanced Fire Solutions Ltd had gone into administration. It proceeded against Mr Ellis alone on the Equality Act claims, and recorded that the claimant's unfair dismissal, notice pay and holiday pay claims against the company were not determined in this judgment.

Applying s.13 and s.136 Equality Act 2010 and a hypothetical comparator, the tribunal rejected the sex discrimination claim against Mr Ellis. It found that the treatment complained of would have been the same regardless of sex, and therefore the direct sex discrimination allegations were not well founded.

The tribunal upheld the marriage and civil partnership discrimination claim. It found that after the claimant separated from Mr Bacon, Mr Ellis distanced himself from her, removed her access to the company's Xero system, allowed Mr Bacon to use company funds for matrimonial legal costs, supported the removal of the claimant as a director without telling her, withheld dividends, stopped the claimant's share loan repayments and diverted them to Mr Bacon, did not address her grievance, and was involved in reporting her to the police. It rejected or did not uphold certain individual allegations, including the tracker allegation, the allegation that he followed her, and the allegation about using unredacted divorce documents.

The tribunal also upheld victimisation under s.27 in relation to the pursuit of the family iPads after the claimant raised a grievance in March 2018, finding that this was retaliation for the protected act. It did not uphold the separate allegation about financial hardship. The judgment does not record any monetary remedy or award.