McBride v Scottish Police Authority

[2016] UKSC 27 UKSC 2014/0235 McBride (Appellant) v Scottish Police Authority (Respondent) (Scotland) On appeal from the Inner House of the Court of Session From 1984, the appellant was employed by the respondent's predecessors as a fingerprints officer. She was dismissed from employment on 1 May 2007. From August 2000 until May 2002, the appellant (along with three colleagues) had been suspended while investigations were ongoing in relation to the identification of a fingerprint (“Y7”) from a crime scene, which had been attributed to a police officer who denied having been in the place it was found, and who was subsequently charged with and acquitted of perjury ("the Shirley McKie case"). The investigations concluded there had been no misconduct and the appellant returned to work on restricted duties from 20 May 2002. Although she completed a 12-18 month retraining course and sought to return to full duties, she remained on restricted duties for the remainder of her employment. Ongoing criticism of the Fingerprint Bureau led to a structural reorganisation culminating in April 2007 in the formation of a single Scottish Fingerprint Service within the newly created statutory body, the Scottish Police Services Authority ("SPSA"), of which David Mulhern was appointed interim Chief Executive. In the process of reorganisation, Mr Mulhern publicly referred to Y7 as a "misidentification"; the appellant and her three colleagues considered it to be a "disputed identification". On 12 September 2006, in a meeting between employer and trade union representatives about the reorganisation, Mr Mulhern made it clear that he did not want the appellant and others who agreed with her about Y7 to be transferred to SPSA but that they could be redeployed in Strathclyde Police. Nevertheless, the appellant's employment transferred to SPSA on 1 April 2007. The appellant was invited to a meeting to discuss redeployment, which took place on 1 May 2007, when the appellant expressed her willingness to consider redeployment but asked for an opportunity to discuss reinstatement to full duties. Following the meeting, she received a letter terminating her employment because of her "inability to carry out the full range of [her] duties and the failure to identify any suitable redeployment options". She brought a claim of unfair dismissal to the Employment Tribunal. The Employment Tribunal made a finding of unfair dismissal and ordered reinstatement. The Employment Appeal Tribunal allowed an appeal by the respondent against the order for reinstatement, revoking the judgment of the Employment Tribunal except insofar as it found that the appellant was unfairly dismissed, the finding of unfair dismissal not being subject to appeal. The Inner House of the Court of Session refused the appellant's appeal insofar as it sought to restore the Tribunal's order for reinstatement. The appellant seeks to restore the Employment Tribunal's original order. The Supreme Court unanimously allows Ms McBride’s appeal. The case is remitted to the original Employment Tribunal, or to a tribunal which includes the member or members of the original Employment Tribunal who are still in office, to consider in what respects it should vary its order for compensation in view of the time that has passed since the order.