You might be wondering if redundancy can be unfair dismissal?
If you’ve been chosen for redundancy, your employer has to follow a fair process. That didn’t happen in this case, and the employee was able to make a claim for unfair dismissal…
For 11 years, Mr Ghaffar was an information and advice worker at Age UK Calderdale and Kirklees.
The charity had been receiving an annual grant of £180,000 to pay for one of Mr Ghaffar’s team, but the funding was stopped in January 2018. As a result, managers had to choose which of three team members would have to lose their job.
They did this by allocating scores. However, they made an error which made it look as though Mr Ghaffar had performed much worse than his colleagues. He was therefore made redundant in April 2018.
Mr Ghaffar took the charity to the Leeds employment tribunal for unfair dismissal.
The tribunal said his employer had shown carelessness and a lack of attention to detail, because they had:
- Made mistakes in the process
- Failed to provide Mr Ghaffar with the reason he was chosen for redundancy
- Failed to give him a copy of his scores against the selection matrix
If Age UK had followed a fair procedure, there was an 80% chance Mr Ghaffar would have kept his job. As a result, he was awarded £12,350.
As with many such cases, the situation was more complicated than that, and Mr Ghaffar also made other complaints.
He claimed his dismissal was discrimination because he was “older and Asian”. Also, that he was chosen because he had lodged a formal complaint when customer service executive, Colin Cromack, appointed his wife, Susan, as the charity’s insurance supervisor, and that this was a misuse of charity funds (which would be a criminal offence if proven).
Although the tribunal found that Age UK had followed poor recruitment practices in this case, with the risk of nepotism and favouritism, they hadn’t broken any employment laws, so Mr Ghaffar’s other complaints were not upheld.
What this means to you
If you think you have been unfairly selected for redundancy, you can appeal or make a claim for unfair dismissal or discrimination. Every situation is different, and often there are complex issues to consider.
Making a claim might only happen to you once in a lifetime, but we deal with similar cases every day, so we probably have the answers to your questions. Why not give us a call? The initial consultation won’t cost you a penny (or a cent).
Further reading
For more information, you might find our other articles useful:
- When is redundancy unfair?
- Redundancy
- Have I been made redundant?
- Was it fair to make you redundant?
- What constitutes unfair dismissal?
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