Mr B McGuigan v Lookers Motor Group Limited — 2024

The tribunal found that Mr McGuigan was dismissed for redundancy after the Business Manager role at Edinburgh Audi was removed. It accepted that there was a genuine redundancy situation and that the Senior Sales Executive role was materially different from the Business Manager role. The respondent had initially proceeded on the basis that no Business Manager posts would remain, although the evidence showed that one Business Manager post was retained in Glasgow.

The tribunal rejected the claimant's argument that the selection exercise for the Senior Sales Executive role was itself unfair. It found that the criteria were permissible, that three managers were involved in the assessment and moderation, and that although there were concerns about the record keeping and the absence of evidence from the two scorers, the process for scoring Mr McGuigan and Mr Bonini was within the range of reasonable responses available to the employer.

The dismissal was held to be unfair because there had been no meaningful consultation with the claimant about the pooling of Business Manager roles across Edinburgh and Glasgow. The tribunal considered that the respondent should have consulted him on the fact that one Business Manager post remained in Glasgow, and it held that this point was not cured by the appeal because the pool issue was not specifically addressed there.

On remedy, the tribunal held that no basic award was payable because the claimant had already received a statutory redundancy payment. It found that proper consultation would only have deferred dismissal for a short period and would not have changed the overall outcome. The compensatory award was therefore limited to one week's net pay, assessed at £891.84. The tribunal noted that the claimant had started work with John Clark (Holdings) Ltd on 22 January 2024 and did not accept that there was a real prospect he would have accepted a Glasgow role.