The Respondent employer appealed against a Judgment holding that the Claimant had been unfairly dismissed.
In a restructuring exercise the Respondent had sought to ‘map’ the Claimant into a new role and did not treat her as redundant. The Claimant resigned in protest, claiming constructive unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal and a redundancy payment. The Tribunal found that the new role was significantly different to the old role, and that the Respondent had breached the implied term of trust and confidence when it failed to consult, failed properly to assess the roles, and failed properly to address the Claimant’s grievance and appeal.
The Tribunal committed no error of law in finding that the Claimant was constructively dismissed. Its overall conclusion and findings of fact were not perverse. However, in finding that the dismissal was unfair the Tribunal failed to direct itself that this was a separate issue, failed to address the issue of reason for dismissal and fairness, and/or failed to give proper reasons for its conclusion that the dismissal was unfair. The Tribunal erred in law to that extent, but that error did not undermine the finding of constructive dismissal. Both parties argued that, if there was a dismissal, the reason was redundancy. The case would be remitted to the Employment Tribunal (to the same Employment Judge) to determine whether the dismissal on grounds of redundancy was unfair.
The claims of wrongful dismissal and for a redundancy payment remained to be heard in the Employment Tribunal.
[2020] UKEAT 0225 – 19 – 0207
Bailii
England and Wales
Employment
Updated: 12 November 2021; Ref: scu.653274