Mr R Holland of Counsel For the v Respondent — 2024

The claimant, Mr Nicki-James Shepherd, said he had been unfairly dismissed because he had made protected disclosures, including an email to the HSE. The respondent said the dismissal was by reason of redundancy arising from financial difficulty. This judgment dealt only with the claimant's application for interim relief, not the final merits of the substantive claim. The tribunal noted that it did not need to make findings of fact for the interim relief test.

The tribunal summarised the claimant's position as relying on one or more protected public interest disclosures, but noted that the pleaded case was not clear as to all disclosures relied upon. It recorded the respondent's denial that it had received or known about the HSE email, and its evidence that the decision-makers who terminated employment had no knowledge of it. The tribunal also recorded the claimant's short service, his employment from 3 July 2023 to 8 December 2023, and the respondent's evidence that it had made redundancies, including five dismissals without consultation where employees lacked two years' service.

Applying the interim relief authorities, the tribunal referred to the need for an expeditious summary assessment, the requirement that the claimant show a 'pretty good chance of success', and the later formulation that 'likely' in this context is nearer to certainty than mere probability. It also considered the point that interim relief is unavailable if the dismissal occurred within the context of a genuine redundancy situation, even if selection for redundancy was said to be influenced by protected disclosures.

On the material before it, the tribunal found that the claimant faced significant difficulties: the disclosure case was unclear, the HSE email was disputed, the respondent's documents showed financial difficulty and a redundancy exercise, and the reason for dismissal appeared to be redundancy. It concluded that the claimant did not have a pretty good chance of success at the full hearing and dismissed the application for interim relief.