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Farnan v Sunderland Association Football Club
The Claimant was the Marketing Director at Sunderland Football Club (“the Club”). The Club summarily dismissed the Claimant without notice for sending sexist emails, making derogatory comments about his female colleague, speaking to journalists off the record and repeatedly breaching confidentiality rules.
The Court held that the Claimant had committed serious and repeated breaches of his employment contract by 'banking' confidential information about sponsorship bids, which he sent to his wife's private email. The Claimant argued that he did this purely for administrative support; however, it was later revealed that he intended to keep the evidence if he ever ended up in dispute with the Club. The Claimant also used the confidential documents to seek employment, liaise with a journalist against Club policy, and wrongly disclosed a sponsorship agreement to a third party. The Claimant argued that he had been wrongly dismissed and that this bonus payment had not been paid. In total the damages claim came to almost one million pounds. The Court rejected these claims and found that on the facts, there was sufficient justification for dismissal without notice.
The Court did, however, criticise the Club for trumping up part of its case against the Claimant. It held that the Claimant’s actions of sending a Christmas card email of 10 bare-breasted women was not gross misconduct.
In Practice
This case was brought in the High Court, due to the amount of damages the Claimant was seeking. The Court still used the same principles as an employment tribunal and the Claimant failed with his claim due to the seriousness of the breaches he made to his contract of employment. Employment Associate Paul Burton says, "This is a reminder to employers that, as long as they go through the correct dismissal procedures, it is possible to dismiss even a senior director without notice."
Our Employment Team, based in Christchurch, also cover Bournemouth, Poole and the New Forest. For a free initial chat, please call 01202 499255 and Paul or a member of the team will be happy to discuss any questions that you may have.
