Mr W argued that he was already doing the new “finance manager” role and in fact the “restructure“ was just a way of getting rid of him.
By way of background a new Director of the Trust, Ms F , was employed in May 2007. Serious difficulties began to arise in the relationship between Mr W and Ms F which became particularly noticeable in early 2009 after Mr W returned from holiday in China.
Ms F said that she found the animosity by Mr W toward her at times shocking, she put it down to a combination of the stress he was under as a result of work pressure and some personal circumstances. She said she came to the view that if his position were changed so that he was under less stress Mr Ws behaviour would return to the pleasant, friendly and helpful way it was prior to July 2008.
She said it was for this reason that she attempted to review and then to change Mr W’s job description, by negotiation. Ms F could not get Mr Wang to agree either on a current job description nor agree to any changes.
So in April 2009 the Board asked the Treasurer to review the organisation which the Board used as the basis for a proposal for a restructure.
Incredibly , (and Unfortunately for the Trust) , the Board did not forward the Treasurer’s report to Mr W until two days before the Employment Relations Authority hearing.
In her evidence to the Tribunal Ms F described the process that the Board followed, how staff (apart from Mr W) engaged in the process and what the desired outcome would be. The desired outcome was that there would be a new role of Finance Manager with significantly more responsibility than any previous position and more than the role that Mr W was actually undertaking at the time. This was combined with a proposal that some of the financial duties be devolved to the project managers employed by the Trust.
Whilst the Court seemed satisfied that the two roles were substantively different they also commented that Mr W had overlooked one significant difference between what he was doing and what was proposed; and that was that there would be a 50% increase in the salary for the new role; a strong indicator of significant differences in the roles.
Once the Board had decided on the restructure they encouraged him to apply for the new position and considered him for redeployment elsewhere. He was not deemed suitable for redeployment elsewhere. So the Court accepted that the redundancy was genuine.
However Mr W was compensated for the lack off air process on the part of the Board for a failure to provide him with a copy of the Treasurers report that led to the restructuring proposal.
The Court further held that Mr W “should have been offered the position by way of redeployment rather than having his previous position terminated and requiring him to apply for the new position when it was advertised.”
