Unfair dismissal selection process update

Nassy

Hi

I thought I would update people on this in the hope that someone searches and finds the information useful.

I lost my unfair dismissal case a few days ago - I fell prey to the "tribunal must not substitute its own view..." rule. The judge felt that the selection pool process used against me was unreasonable but that the same pool could have been defined by a reasonable employer..

Basically 2 employees on my team were given a "role change" that meant they could supervise me. The supervision was never actually enforced and only came about because of delays to a project I worked on (despite the fact that a whole team of people worked on the project and no transparent review was done). The same 2 employee ended up retaining their job (at my expense) through a messy two tiered selection pool process including selection pool errors and clear targeting of individuals. The employer was found to be very dishonenst in some arguments too. Unfortunately, because I had made it clear that the business did understand that there had been a role change (regardless of how pointless and superficial it ended up being) I lost. The worst part is that I realise that had I been prepared to be dishonest (since there was no documentation proving there was any role change and the relevant witnesses could not attend) then I may have won... I know this because of the tactics used in cross-examination by the barrister - it was painfully obvious!

Nevertheless as bad as I feel my employer behaved, and as flawed as I feel some parts of redundancy law is (iI think there are definite limitations to judging cases simply based on precedent as it means that the bigger picture cannot be considered) I could never lie to gain money. I would hate myself - it is just not who I am. :eek:

Anyway the positive side is that the judge was sympathetic with me. My former employer had been desperate to negotiate with me by hanging the threat of a cost award in my face - and their barrister kept bringing it up at every opportunity. The judge said on a couple of occasions though that he absolutely could see why I was in court and that a cost award application has very low chance of success. Hopefully my former employer will understand that it is best they treat people equally and can't just barge their way into court hoping cost awards will cover the cost. They appear so pig headed I doubt they get the logic ie majority of people won't complain unless there is something wrong! :cool: No doubt they are pleased with themselves but they won on a technicality of law and because they paid for a barrister- not because they behaved "fairly" ... I definitely can now see why legal representation is a good idea - but then on the other hand that would have cost $$$$ and would have been a big gamble.

Anyway its not all been bad- feel that I stood up to my employer and learnt some valuable life skills from putting myself in the uncomfortable position of facing people I used to get on very well with but were now witnesses for my former employer. Good luck to anyone planning to do the same!

Nassy

Googlewacker, they instructed a barrister - no idea if that was covered or not. It was me that didnt pay for legal help. Case was quite convoluted so even with legal help it wouldn't have been a definite win. This is the irony - the more convoluted the case - the more you need help but then the more of a gamble it actually is! :cool: If I'd got in early with a solictors letter it may have got them to settle (since they were probably less likely to know their prospects until later on) ... but I'll never know now.