Co-operative Group has faced legal action from a former company executive who claims the organisation embarked upon a “deliberate campaign” to compromise her reputation following an act of whistleblowing in which she expressed concerns over what she believes is the company’s malpractice and poor governance.

Kathleen Harmeston was employed as procurement director of Co-operative Group in April 2014 before being placed on ‘garden leave’ in June of that year before being quietly dismissed three months later. Her tribunal hearing is now underway in Manchester and she is seeking £5 million in damages for unfair dismissal.

Ms Harmeston defended her performance at Co-op as well as her prior years of experience in the field of procurement which has made her “a well known person in the industry” with a nomination for Businesswoman of the Year award in 2012.

Explaining the alleged malpractice at Co-op, Ms Harmeston claimed the spending of 70% of the company’s overall £1.5bn fortune was not detailed in the officially published procurement policy released by the organisation. She further stated that Co-operative Group is “haemorrhaging money” due to high costs amassed by hiring management consultant services; a expenditure costing between £4m and £8m during 2013 alone.

Ms Harmeston’s revelations allegedly led to her being put on ‘garden leave’ in June 2014 and later being dismissed from the company entirely in September that year. Allan Leighton, the Co-operative Group chairman, responded to the allegations at tribunal: “We dismissed her because she acted in a manner which was not in keeping with the importance and seniority of her role, nor the values and principles of the Co-op.”

The respondent made further assertions which questioned Ms Harmeston’s credibility as a reliable witness. The company’s legal team explored a dispute she had with the organisation after being hired in which she insisted on having an office based on a different floor to the one she was allocated at the company’s offices in a bid to make her appear resentful towards Co-op.

There was also an emphasis on Ms Hemberton’s career prior to her employment at Co-op, with details of how she had worked closely with a consultancy firm that were investigated for misconduct against Royal Mail when working with the postal organisation several years ago.

Bringing this historic information to light is a not-so subtle effort intended to bring Ms Harmeston’s dependability into question. However, the Co-operative group is likely to be proven to have been aware of Ms Harmeston’s conduct while employed at Royal Mail as her efforts at reducing the company’s expenditure was essential to her being hired by Co-op.

As part of her witness statement, Ms Harmeston maintained that she “at all times acted with the utmost integrity” regarding Co-op’s business interests. She also expressed how she felt about her former employer’s behaviour towards her:

“It is difficult for me to escape the conclusion that the respondent embarked upon a deliberate campaign to comprehensively disparage my reputation with staff, suppliers and within the Executive Search community seeking to neutralise the impact of my disclosures and to utterly destroy my hard won reputation and career.”

An act of whistleblowing is protected by the Public Interest Disclosure Act where there is reasonable belief that an employee was dismissed as part of a company’s response to , an employee voiding their concerns, which results in such action being labelled unfair dismissal.

Ms Harmeston also asserted that Co-op used deceptive conduct as a means of monitoring her when they gave her the code name “Wimbledon” in order to keep aware of her actions using a system that would not lead a “paper trail” back to her. The Co-operative group dismisses all claims Ms Harmeston is making against it and has claimed it will “fully and robustly defend our decision to dismiss Kath Harmeston”.

The ongoing tribunal and is expected to last for two weeks.

The issue of treatment towards transgender employees has long been a controversial one in employment law. Until recently there was no defining notion of how transgender concerns should be handled by employers, but now, as transgender issues are becoming ever more vocal in UK society, government guidance is reflecting this.

Nicky Morgan, the UK Minister for Women and Equalities, has revealed the release of two new legal documents that provide employer guidelines on how transgender employees should be treated. The first document is known as ‘The recruitment and retention of transgender staff’, and the second is named ‘Providing services for transgender customers‘

Working together these two guides are intended to give businesses the information they need to assist with the recruitment and training of transgender employees, as well as provide helpful advice regarding common problems that transgender employees face.

Ms Morgan also spoke of the prejudice individuals experience in UK workplaces: “Many transgender people still face discrimination in the workplace, as well as in their day-to-day lives. The guidance for employers and service providers we are publishing today is an important step towards helping improve knowledge and understanding to ensure all members of our society can live their lives free from discrimination”

Every complicated aspect of gender is explored across the two reports which define gender reassignment as “when a person takes steps to alter the outward expression of their gender so that it is better aligns with sense of who they are”.

Employers are also advised that it will not always be possible to identify an individual’s gender simply by their appearance and voice.

To better understand the content of the new documents, here is a brief overview of each report.

 

Providing Services For Transgender Customers

The guidelines that comprise the Providing Services For Transgender Customers guide is intended to “set the atmosphere and culture” for transgender employees in the workplace. This cultural assistance is broad and ranges from helping with physical comfort at work to appropriate verbal and written forms of identification for employees.

The guide explains the rationale for such changes: “Our different backgrounds, experience and perspectives mean we think about issues in different ways, see new solutions and opportunities to improve”.

Several renowned UK employers have already expressed support for the new guidelines, including British supermarkets like Sainsburys and Asda as well as international restaurants like MacDonalds. This guide also highlights the problems discrimination against individuals can have for the function of a workforce: “If barriers exist to the recruitment and retention of transgender staff, employers miss out on this potential.”

The report explains that companies which adopt policies supporting transgender lifestyles will be far less likely to receive public complaints and will also make legal action against businesses by transgender people less likely.

Employers are urged to ensure transgender employees are protected from members of the public as well as fellow staff if the job they perform involves customer service. Businesses that find employees experiencing hateful actions by the public have a duty to prevent these actions as much as possible, with legal assistance if necessary.

 

The Recruitment and Recognition of Transgender Staff

The second report known as “The Recruitment and Recognition of Transgender Staff” is intended to guarantee that transgender employees already in employment receive the best possible assistance with their concerns. Employers are advised to conduct regular checks in order to ensure that their business is meeting the needs of all transgender employees

Interestingly the report does not suggest that changes be made for the convenience of a transgender employee if the individual and/or employer feel the change will have the effect of isolating the employee from their colleagues and potentially hinder how they are perceived at work. The guide urges fair treatment without the introduction of changes that anticipate issues of offence which may harm career opportunities. The guide sums this up by stating that employers should “be mindful of issues that can arise, but don’t expect there to be problems”.

The most prominent mental health trust in the UK has been forced to admit wrongdoing over its treatment of a whistleblower who spoke out over alleged bullying and harassment occurring at the trust. The NHS has now acknowledged that Dr Hayley Dare’s claims were made in good faith and in the interest of the public.

 

Dr Dare spoke out about a culture of bullying and harassment occurring at 32 institutions currently operated by the West London Mental Health NHS Trust, which includes locations such as Broadmoor high-security hospital. The claims were rejected and even mocked by NHS bosses when Dr Dare first made her claims in 2013.

 

During a conversation with trust officials, Dr Dare was referred to as a “very disturbed woman” by chief executive Mr Steve Shrubb, who then made unflattering comparisons between the doctor and his own ex-wife in a verbal tirade designed to undermine her credibility both personally and professionally. During the recent tribunal Mr Shrubb apologised for his comments.
The NHS spent a total of £130,000 during its effort to refute the claim even though the organisation admitted it has numerous bullying and harassment issues existing at its facilities around the UK.

 

Official NHS staff surveys released in 2012 and 2013 clearly show that out of the 51 NHS mental health trusts, the West London Mental Health NHS Trust has by far the poorest records in regards to violence happening against staff due to0 the actions of both patients and colleagues.

 

This includes nearly a twelfth of all employees who experience a case of physical violence at the hands of a peer. Other results show that 30% of staff at the trust were bullied or harassed in some way during 2013, and that 26% of these cases include acts of discriminative behaviour.

 

Dr Dare originally lost her tribunal case in September 2014 as a result of a legal technicality that prevented her claims from being considered to have been made in in good faith. However, this technicality was removed from UK employment law since then.

 

Following the initial ruling the NHS sought to win back the costs it accrued during the legal process, which meant that Dr Dare would have been made to pay back as much as £100,000. However, this was prevented from becoming a reality when judge ruled this unfair at a second tribunal held shortly after the original ruling last year.

 

With the technicality now void the trust has been forced to admit that Dr Dare “made a disclosure in the public interest about the bullying and harassment of the staff of the [trust] and that this disclosure was made in good faith”.

 

The trust also paid Dr Dare £10,000 in reparation for the financial costs she paid during her legal struggle.

 

After the tribunal verdict Dr Dare spoke of her relief:

“I can’t quite express how overwhelmed I feel. This has always been about patient care and staff welfare, which is what whistleblowing should always be about. I never deviated from that so I feel exonerated at last. The trust has spent an obscene amount of taxpayers’ money fighting me. I never acted in bad faith and that was what the case was all about. This has always been about my integrity and the fact that I raised concerns about patient care as a clinician. If you bully staff, patient care will be affected.”

 

Dr Dare also expressed hope that the result of this case could help other employees gain the confidence to speak out about NHS corruption. With 3,160 staff currently working in the West London Mental Health NHS Trust, and with approximately 700,000 patients being cared for, there is concern that there are many other cases of bullying and harassment being overlooked.

 

Despite the trust acknowledging Dr Dare’ made her claim in good faith, the organisation did not give a full apology and pointed out that there are a “number of ways in which staff can raise concerns safely” which she should have undertaken before launching an external legal evaluation.

Labour market discrimination has long been a serious issue throughout UK employment law, but a newly established government scheme is now challenging this thanks to a rule that no longer necessitates students include their name(s) on applications they make for either employment or educational positions. The intention of this is to eradicate the likelihood of employers making a social and/or cultural assumption about the candidate based on their name(s).

This new application process, known as a “name-blind” policy, is fully endorsed by the Tory government and will also mean that a potential employer will not not be privy to the candidate’s name until they are shortlisted for an interview.

The organisations actively lending their support to this new approach are responsible for the combined employment of 1.8m people in Britain, across both private and public sectors. These are some of the most recognisable names in the country, such as the NHS, the BBC and the Civil Service. Even many well-known privatised companies like Teach First, KPMG, HSBC and Virgin Money have voiced their support.

The use of name-blind applications has support from many leading scholars too. Vikki Boliver, a senior sociology lecturer at Durham University, conducted a recent investigation into the applications of several leading UK universities on behalf of the Russell Group and noted that from 2010-12 only 36% of applicants of ethnic origin received a university place compared to 55% of white candidates. Bolivier believes that name-blind applications “may help some” but that the change is “definitely not a solution” to some of the biases that recruiters hold.

Employer preference for employees with white sounding names is not a UK only issue, as recent French employment law studies show that applicants with foreign names are less likely to receive a response from an employer in France.

How did name-blind applications begin?

Changing the process of revealing applicant names began in 2009 when a government report concluded that UK employers place emphasis on arranging interviews with candidates with a western name despite other applicants showing the same level of skill and experience.

David Cameron recently explained that UK university admissions service, UCAS, is to embrace the name-blind application process beginning in 2017. This announcement comes in spite of UCAS’s own independent research which they claim found no evidence that a bias against ethnic names existed in their application process.

At a recent speech in Manchester the PM outlined the government’s stance on why name-blind applications are needed: “You send out your CV far and wide but you get rejection after rejection — what’s wrong?” “It’s not the qualifications or the previous experience. It’s just two words at the top: first name, surname.”

This emphasis on tackling discrimination at work is part of recent Tory intentions to alter the public perception of the party’s attitude towards race following criticism that the government’s attitude to Islamic extremism has led to some Muslims being unfairly investigated.

Could this lead to further changes?

Once the name-blind policy is enforced there could be further changes made in the form of applications that no longer require information on applicant gender. The ongoing controversy over the gender pay gap between men and women provides strong justification for enforcing this.

There is an average 9% pay gap in Britain regarding the gender earnings of employees aged over 40, although the gap for younger employees is falling. These figures come amid new legislation requiring large companies to release details on the bonuses paid to their male and female employees.

A tribunal case involving alleged unfair dismissal due to whistleblowing is underway against Lloyds Banking Group.

Former foreign trader, Paul Carlier, has accused the bank of forcing him into redundancy after he publicly revealed details of a currency trade with Tesco supermarket.

Speaking at the recent London employment tribunal, Mr Carlier claimed he was dismissed from his £175,000 a year job as a result of having made several protected disclosures in which he “challenged the business over various practices”.

Mr Carlier is representing himself at the tribunal where he expressed a belief that his actions of September 2014 were a direct cause of receiving unfair treatment from Anders Henrikson, the head of foreign exchange product at Lloyds.

This was refuted by Mr Henrikson who told the tribunal that Mr Carlier’s dismissal was actually the result of him not reaching agreed business targets. Carlier made £557,000 for Lloyds but ultimately fell short of the £1.7 million he was expected to generate.

While being cross examined Mr Henrikson created an unflattering image of Mr Carlier by claiming that the bank had received offensive emails from the banker which were “frequently offensive in tone and content”. These emails, which were sent after Carlier learned of his dismissal, are so explicit in content that they were initially blocked by Lloyd’s firewall security system.

Mr Carlier’s reputation was also questioned at the tribunal after evidence showed he had a number of county court judgements against him at the time of his being hired by the bank in 2011.

Mr Henrikson also dismissed the idea that Mr Carlier was a whistleblower experiencing persecution, stating that the former banker’s actions while working for Lloyds were far from damning and actually constitute standard criticism within the banking sector: “Paul was vocal in expressing his opinions on the spot [foreign exchange] desk but I did not regard him as a whistleblower”.

Carlier has not yet given evidence at the ongoing tribunal but is likely to reject all the claims against him.

A Lloyds spokesperson released a statement clarifying the bank’s current position on this case; “As the employment tribunal is ongoing, it would be inappropriate for us to comment in detail, other than to say that the allegations are without merit and we are defending them vigorously.”

The hearing will continue at a later date.

Lloyds has been at the centre of several legal controversies in recent years. In 2014 the bank suspended seven employees following a court ruling which forced it to pay £226m for being involved in a case of UK interest rate rigging.