Record Disability Discrimination Payout for Welsh firm Jewson, Jonathan Jones had been employed by Jewson for 22 years as a branch manager when he suffered a stroke and was dismissed due to ill health.
Overturning a tribunal’s finding of unfair dismissal, the EAT has held that an employer had properly decided on the basis of the evidence available to it, which included a report from occupational health and a clinical psychologist, that an employee was not fit to return to his stressful managerial role. His dismissal for ‘capability’ (or rather the lack of it) was fair. The EAT reiterated that the decision to dismiss an employee is a managerial one and not a medical one. An employer should make its own assessment of the risk to an employee’s health from returning to work.
An ET held that the heavy-handed way in which a manager dealt with suspected unauthorised absence entitled the employee to resign and claim unfair dismissal
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