The process of selecting staff for redundancy is fraught with legal pitfalls and seeking professional advice at the outset can save you from serious financial and reputational damage in the long run.
A case on point can be seen here when a local authority mismanaged employment aspects of a school closure (Gwynedd Council v Barratt and Another).
The case concerned two teachers who worked at a school which was closed as part of wholesale reorganisation of education in the council’s area. They were warned in advance that their employment would be terminated and that they would need to go through a full application and interview process if they wished to work at a new school which was to be opened on the same site.
The teachers were dismissed on grounds of redundancy after unsuccessfully applying for positions at the new school but subsequently launched Employment Tribunal (ET) proceedings. In upholding their unfair dismissal claims, the ET noted that they had been denied any opportunity to appeal against their dismissal.
The council argued, without success, that their redundancy was inevitable, given the closure of the old school, and that affording them appeals would have made no difference.
In rejecting the council’s challenge to that outcome, the Employment Appeal Tribunal noted that the teachers had both a statutory and contractual right to appeal before they were made redundant.
No attempt had been made to consult them about the way the redundancy exercise would be carried out. Decisions which had already been made were merely communicated to them.
Given that the vast majority of staff at the old school had been taken on by the new school, their dismissal was not inevitable and the process followed was fundamentally and profoundly unfair.
There was no evidence that the council could not have redeployed the teachers to one of the 100 or so other schools within its educational estate. The requirement for the teachers to apply for the new jobs and without the benefit of any nomination by the Council, as relevant regulations provided for, fell outside the band of responses open to a reasonable employer.
If not agreed, the amount of the teachers’ compensation would be assessed at a further hearing.
Rachel Fereday, Head of Employment commented, “The manner in which the redundancy process is conducted is important. You must select people for redundancy in a fair way and not discriminate against any individuals or groups. There must also be a genuine consultation with the employees. If you do need to make employees redundant then please click here to contact a member of our highly skilled Employment department for practical and pragmatic advice and guidance.”
