Employers – Feelings of Unfairness Cannot Justify Penalising Whistleblowers

Even employers who feel that they have been unfairly criticised have no excuse for targeting whistleblowers for detrimental treatment. An Employment Tribunal (ET) powerfully made that point in the case of a senior care worker who raised welfare and safeguarding concerns affecting residents in a…

Jan 06, 2023

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After making the disclosures, both to the care home’s owner and to public healthcare authorities, the woman was suspended. She resigned in the midst of a disciplinary process and launched ET proceedings.

Upholding her case, the ET found that she had made three protected disclosures in the reasonable belief that the information disclosed was substantially true. She had been subjected to various detriments – including her suspension – the imposition of which was materially influenced by her whistleblowing. In short, she was constructively dismissed because she blew the whistle.

The employer felt that the disclosures were tremendously unfair, but the ET had no hesitation in finding that it conducted itself in a manner calculated to damage or destroy the employment relationship of mutual trust and confidence and did so because she had the temerity to make protected disclosures. The employer thereby fundamentally and repeatedly breached her employment contract.

She did not receive the benefit of a proper investigation and the evidence indicated that the employer had no real interest in discussing her concerns or properly looking into them. The investigating and dismissing officers were one and the same and a disciplinary hearing had been conducted in an unprofessional manner that left her feeling humiliated. She was suspended without reasonable or proper cause.

The employer was ordered to pay her basic and compensatory awards in respect of her automatic and ordinary unfair dismissal, totalling £5,576. She was also awarded £16,875 for injury to her feelings.

Employer Pays Price for ‘Abject’ Failures in Disciplinary Process

Dismissing an employee for misconduct without first engaging in a transparent and fair disciplinary process is the legal equivalent of holding a gun to your head. In a case on point, an Employment Tribunal (ET) did not mince words in publicly exposing an employer’s abject procedural failures. A gas engineer who had risen to a senior management role in the company for which he worked was summoned to a meeting on his return from a business trip. He was informed that a client had complained about…

Whistleblowing and the Need to Prove a Causal Link – Guideline Ruling

In order to succeed in a workplace whistleblowing claim, it is not enough merely to prove that you have made a protected disclosure. As one case showed, it is also necessary to establish a causal link between the disclosure and any detrimental treatment to which you have been subjected. The case involved a senior employee in a bank’s audit department. In a draft report, she expressed concerns about the bank’s risk exposure arising from a certain legal agreement. There was no dispute that she…

Are You Sure Your Employee’s Misbehaviour is Not Disability-Related?

You may be justified in dismissing a misbehaving employee but, before doing so, it is always essential to ask yourself whether their conduct may arise from a disability. An Employment Tribunal (ET) powerfully made that point in upholding a diabetic hotel worker’s disability discrimination claim. The employee, who suffered from insulin-dependent type 1 diabetes, admitted that his behaviour in the six months he worked at the hotel was sometimes poor. He was dismissed following an incident in…