Placketts have to pay
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• A Nottingham industrial tribunal has ordered Placketts Transport to pay a driver £3,860 — even though it accepted that the company had reasonable grounds to believe he was a thief.
It was ruled that driver Phillip Stead must be compensated for unfair dismissal because of the way that dismissal was carried out.
The tribunal was told that the company had suffered from a series of thefts of goods entrusted to it as a carrier. Just before Christmas 1985 large quantities of certain types of goods were disappearing without trace.
Ringleader
Information was received by the company's security officer implicating four men including Stead. He was also informed by the police that Stead had been seen going to the house of a man named as the ringleader. Following investigation suspects were confronted, one of whom said Stead had helped to pass goods over the fence surrounding the company's premises.
Stead denied unspecific allegations of theft put to him, but the company did not believe his denial and, on that basis, dismissed him.
The tribunal said it had no reason to doubt that the company's belief in Stead's guilt but was not satisfied that the dismissal had been carried out properly within the rules of natural justice.
Proper chance
These required that, if a man was to be dsimissed on an allegation of a criminal offence, he must have a proper opportunity to know the details of the case against him and a proper chance to answer that case.
Here it was absolutely clear that Stead had no such opportunity whatsoever. He did not know who was accusing him, when any offence was alleged to have taken place, or even what he was said to have done. He could not possibly answer the allegation against him at the time of his dismissal and that could not be regarded under any circumstances as a reasonable manner in which to carry out the dismissal.