Mr Imad El Kanj v Intesa Sanpaolo S.P.A. — 2025

The tribunal heard Mr El Kanj's application for interim relief on 5 March 2025. He sought reinstatement pending his unfair dismissal hearing, saying Intesa Sanpaolo was forcing him back to Milan in retaliation and that he had made protected disclosures in May 2024. The respondent said he remained employed under an Italian contract and secondment agreement, had not been dismissed, and had not made protected disclosures. The tribunal decided the application on the papers, statements and submissions, without hearing oral evidence.

Applying the section 128 and 129 Employment Rights Act 1996 test, and the threshold described in Hancock v Ter-Berg and another, the tribunal held that there were significant evidential difficulties for the claimant. It found it unclear whether there had been a dismissal at all, noting that he had been paid in February 2025, that the respondent said he had a role to return to in Italy, and that the secondment agreement was for a fixed-term UK posting with an early termination clause allowing transfer back to Milan.

On the whistleblowing aspect, the tribunal said it was unclear from the papers what acts of whistleblowing were alleged. It found little evidence that the claimant had made public interest disclosures, observing that the material he relied on appeared mainly to concern private matters such as salary, visa issues, promised terms and team-management complaints, and that he was unable to specify what in those documents amounted to disclosure of a breach of legal obligation or regulatory issue.

The tribunal also considered causation and said that, even if any of the claimant's statements were protected disclosures, the issue was complicated by his earlier complaints and by the respondent's case that the secondment ended because of a breakdown in the London relationship. It concluded that the claimant had not shown he was likely to succeed on the section 103A complaint, so the application for interim relief was refused and dismissed.