Help worried sick here. Gross Misconduct

phathanded

i am off to my disciplinary now. Will update you all on what happens as soon as I can. I cant thank you all enough for your support and help through this time. The only thing that has kept me going throughout this is all your help. Fingers crossed.

Sambucus_Nigra

phathanded wrote: »

The thing is SarEl to my knowledge there has been no other incidences of homophobic behaviour in the company. Also, would the company not have to train the staff after the first incident to clarify the companys position on this issue?

No, you don't need to train people not to be homophobic. Nor would you have to tell anyone that there had been a previous incident. If that were the case, nobody would ever get any work done if they were constantly training people to do the bleedin' obvious.

SarEl

phathanded wrote: »

The thing is SarEl to my knowledge there has been no other incidences of homophobic behaviour in the company. Also, would the company not have to train the staff after the first incident to clarify the companys position on this issue?

The employer is not required to advertise such things! What you know and what is happening are also not the same thing. And I was giving a hypothetical example - not pressing a case!

No the company are not required to train staff. You (as in anyone) should know better than to think that bullying, harrassment or discrimination are ok. Besides which - training staff is not intended to teach staff not to act in bigoted ways (in fact the evidence is that it simply teaches bigots how to be cleverer bigots. Training is an employers defence to show that they do not accept such behaviour and are acting in such a way as to eradicate it.

SarEl

saintjammyswine wrote: »

You sneaky !!!!!!!

To be fair, this was another hypothetical. If I actually was in the employers shoes and I had reasonable belief such a thing was happening I wouldn't actually do this - I would dismiss. I find it sends a much clearer message than training does!

saintjammyswine

SarEl wrote: »

To be fair, this was another hypothetical. If I actually was in the employers shoes and I had reasonable belief such a thing was happening I wouldn't actually do this - I would dismiss. I find it sends a much clearer message than training does!

Oh I agree entirely. Does highlight how a clever(crafty) employer can get round some legislation though. Oh and the exclamation marks make the 'sneaky' comment look worse than it was by the way!

SarEl

saintjammyswine wrote: »

Oh I agree entirely. Does highlight how a clever(crafty) employer can get round some legislation though. Oh and the exclamation marks make the 'sneaky' comment look worse than it was by the way!

Wasn't taken the wrong way. I may be an employees lawyer, but that doesn't mean that I think all dismissals are unfair (not referring to the OP here - i don't know enough about both sides of the story to form an opinion). Some dismissals are not only utterly fair but entirely warranted. Unfortunately, all too often the people who ought to be sacked are often not the ones who are. Hence a lot of the people who go through my office are the victims of bullying, bigotry and harassment, not the perpetrators of it - they are all too often happily still sitting securely in their jobs.

phathanded

Just back from my disciplinary. There still is no outcome yet. My union delegate was absolutely fantastic I must say. He put all the relevant points across about the allegations and the investigation. The manager is going to try and identify the third person on Monday. I am not out of the woods yet but my delegate has put forward a very strong case on my behalf. The proper ACAS procedures have not been followed as well as other breaches of procedure. My delegate says they could still sack me but it would be a mistake to do so.
Will update when I get more information and a final outcome. Thankyou everyone for your support.

Sambucus_Nigra

That's good news. However I still can't see the relevance of this third person. If he IDs him/her then what? If he doesn't, then again - what?

phathanded

Thats exactly what my delegate said Sambucus. They have now realised they havent followed the proper prcedures and are trying to rectify that by doing it 3 weeks after the event. My delegate says we will just let them get on with it because it is not helping their side of the case at all. Thanks for all your advice it really helped. Not to say I am definately not going to get sacked but today has put real faith in the unions for me.

rachelhen

Glad you feel that your official union support is good it must be some comfort. I will keep sending positive vibes x