Ian Ritson v Milan Babic Architects Limited
[2024] EAT 95
L Fry v Kingswood Learning & Leisure Group Ltd
21 November 2023
[2023] EAT 166
Employment Appeal Tribunal
An employee was fired due to redundancy. She claimed it was because she reported her boss's bad behavior (whistleblowing). The judge found the boss didn't know about the report before firing her. The employee appealed, but the appeal court agreed with the first judge's decision, saying there was enough evidence to support it.
Key Facts
- •Mrs Fry (claimant/appellant) was dismissed from her employment with Kingswood Learning & Leisure Group Ltd (respondent) due to redundancy.
- •Mrs Fry claimed that her dismissal was in response to protected disclosures she had made regarding the inappropriate behaviour of her line manager, Mr Husband.
- •The Employment Tribunal found that Mr Husband was not aware of the protected disclosures at the time he made the decision to dismiss Mrs Fry.
- •Mrs Fry appealed this decision, arguing that the Tribunal's finding was perverse and that inadequate reasons were given.
Legal Principles
Perversity test: An appeal based on perversity will only succeed if the Employment Tribunal reached a decision that no reasonable Tribunal would have reached.
Yeboah v Crofton [2002] IRLR 634 at paragraph 93
Adequacy of reasons: Employment Tribunals must give adequate reasons for their decisions so that the parties understand why they won or lost, and so that the appeal court can understand the reasoning.
Meek v City of Birmingham District Council [1987] IRLR 250; English v Emery Reimbold & Strick [2002] 1 WLR 2409; Frame v Governing Body of the Llangiwg Primary School [2020] UKEAT/0320/19; DPP Law Limited v Greeenberg [2021] EWCA Civ 672
Burden of proof in whistleblowing cases: Where an employee has less than two years' service, the burden of proving that the reason or principal reason for dismissal was the protected disclosure lies with the claimant.
Employment Tribunal judgment
Outcomes
The Employment Appeal Tribunal dismissed Mrs Fry's appeal.
The EAT found that the Employment Tribunal's decision was not perverse. The Tribunal's finding that Mr Husband lacked knowledge of the protected disclosures was supported by the evidence, particularly Mr Watson's testimony. The EAT also held that the Tribunal had given adequate reasons for its decision, even though Mr Husband's evidence was inconsistent.