Nice to meet you

Yes I had the mail notification of your reply, but writing this at nearly 9pm Friday, it hasn't been let through..... the name Rona is live - so that might be the reason. I cannot work out why the security system NAS uses blocks helpful content, but still lets in spam

Hi did comment but its been queued for administrators approval for some reason?

Agree, and I suspect that would legally overrule any gagging clause in an employment contract (in the same way that companies cannot contract themselves out of personal injury claims - this used to be the case, anyhow!)

I would hope that if this case ever got to a tribunal, there would be extra support available for your friend in court, however there may be a deadline for making a claim. Standard unfair dismissal is usually 3 months however it may be different for disability claims.

I have just found this organisation www.equalityadvisoryservice.com who ought to be able to advise. 

It would be good for your friend if it could be resolved as stateofindependence suggests, by simply placing the employer with the alternatives of bad publicity or civil action and geting an out of court settlement.

At the same time though, the activities of management in this case strike me as blatent disability hate crime and harrassment, and could be subject to criminal prosecution. If Unite have kept documentation that might facilitate, and there might be some injury compensation out of a successful prosecution.

Watching out for evidence, shouting, persuading others to isolate her, getting people to inform on her etc. is getting pretty close to criminal behaviour. It also suggests that they hadn't a case for legitimate dismissal and used harrassment to undermine her and make it easier. They have left her with serious loss of confidence unable to find work. That is surely criminal injury.

I did survive something like this about twenty years ago, on and off over about 5 years. I worked with a team who didn't want to work with me and persistently tried to get me sacked. However each time it went to management it was thrown out, as no substantive evidence was produced. However over time it did greatly undermine my confidence and it was resolved by transferring me.

It was before my diagnosis and part of the problem seems to have been my need for clarification, as I have difficulty following procedures that seem easy to others. They were also very cliquey and didn't want me in their group, and it emerged much later that there was some graft/fraud going on, which they were evidently afraid I might disclose.

Their methods were similar. My desk and shelves were searched for inciminating evidence. I was moved to different offices regularly so I never got settled. The people I shared with were asked to report any strange behaviours that they could use as evidence (though many of them told me and expressed their disgust). I had been assigned a good computer but it was taken off me on some pretext that a colleague could make better use of part of the software; I was given a much older faulty computer, then complaints made I couldn't work it properly. I was obliged to go to mentoring sessions in other departments to resolve alleged failings.

The complaints would go to management every six to eight months. A long list of "crimes" would be read out to me. One piece of evidence over and over again was something taken out of context that looked bad until explained - but all I had to do each time was point to the date and remind management it had come up before. The evidence was mostly hearsay and trivia blown out of all proportion.

On one occasion I was accused of an expensive financial botch up which they insisted I be sacked for immediately. It went high up in management and I was on the point of dismissal, but managed to produce documentation that showed they had made the mistake. But all they got was a telling off.

As I say I did survive it with my self confidence badly undermined, and years later one of my persecutors, the one who really botched the finances on the above occasion, was found to be doing a lot of dishonest things.

But what Rona describes as happening to a colleague on the spectrum sounds to me more like disability hate crime and if the evidence is sufficient, meriting criminal prosecution.

That is appalling. Do you still work there? If you don't, then the company can hardly sack you for breach of contract if you speak to newspapers (though I appreciate you may still want a reference from them!). In case there is some other legal aspect to this clause in the contract, it would be worth taking it to a law centre to get them to check the specifics. 

I used to work as a legal secretary and typed up of hundreds of cases where people had been unfairly dismissed. I only saw one or two where it was actually going to a tribunal, companies would generally settle out of court with a "Compromise Agreement"; paying the employee off with a lump sum and a reference, in exchange for them never speaking about the matter. Typing up these contracts was about 95% of my job.

If a matter goes to court then the company runs the risk of the local press hearing about the matter (especially if someone happens to tip them off anonymously). They are obviously very keen to avoid bad publicity, which in this age of social media, would travel very fast indeed. So my guess is that this company would probably cough up if they thought this could happen.

I don't know what this visitor attraction is, but I am guessing that it might not be one of the larger ones? The larger companies I have dealt with tend to find other ways to get rid of people, like making redundancies or restructuring, or offering a payout up front. The smaller companies and charities seemed to be the worst offenders when it came to breaching employment law - and a social media campaign against a smaller company could finish them off. 

Good luck 

Thanks for explaining the circumstances, quite appalling.

Not a good advertisement for Unite - after the TUC brought out its Guide to Autism in the Workplace in June last year, which I've criticised elsewhere as inadequate. Unite should have taken stronger action over this. But the TUC Guide, because the Social Model is essential to Socialist thinking, waffled the real issues facing people on the spectrum in the workplace. It demonstrates the ineffectuality of the TUC.

This is Word Autism Awareness Week. You have just given us an example of why we need world-wide awareness.

Despite the coalition Government's assurances people with autism are disgracefully treated in this country and it is a scandalous blot on this country that a company can behave like that a get away with it hiding behind procedure.

Thanks so much for your advice- I think it would be worthwhile pursuing compensation but my friend always forsees difficulties ahead of time and stresses about it -and with a court process she is afraid of having to appear and be cross examined. Unite was involved and the union rep said he didn't know what to do next, after her final meeting with management and dismissal. Interestingly, she received her P45 first thing the very next morning in the post, so it must have been posted before her meeting and dismissal, which means it was a foregone conclusion. 

I'm sure Unite would still have her documents. It was a restaurant/catering position in a visitor attraction. I worked there too and saw for myself what was going on. We are unable to speak to newspapers as we signed a work contract with a clause that prevents us.

They did set up a formal disciplinary process with the intention of removing her from her job which took about 18 months, step by step. She was sent to an occupational doctor twice who made it clear in his letter that by law, her disability needed to be taken into consideration and adjustments made in the tasks given to her. For example, multi-tasking was difficult and to be avoided. On her second visit, he said that his recommendations were not being followed by the management and later, was disappointed and sorry when he heard she had been dismissed.

During the 18 months process of daily assessments, her confidence was ripped to shreds. The criticisms were trivial things that would not have been pointed out to anyone else. The supervisors had been told to watch out for anything they could twist into a mistake. She was shouted at, sworn at and repeatedly bullied. At one time when something went wrong and she denied being involved, she was called a liar, and there was no apology when it was proven incorrect. I can vouch that she is totally truthful and honest and would always volunteer information if something went wrong. But they seemed unaware of her good qualities. 

One time, when she was crying after being told off, we, the other workers, were instructed not to speak to her to comfort her. A supervisor asked me to tell him if my friend phoned me after work as he didn't want her "pestering me"- I replied that she was my friend and after work we were perfectly entitled to speak as often as we liked. Other workers were encouraged to inform on her if she made a mistake and some interfered with her work and made put down comments because they felt the management was allowing it. She only made mistakes on tasks that they persistently told her she was useless at. Although I didn't hear any myself, several colleagues told me that there were cruel jokes made about her by the managers and supervisors in the office and on social occasions.

They used to get her in first thing in the morning to set up before everyone else arrived and this she repeatedly didn't do to their exacting standards, more out of nerves than anything else. She was so stressed out, she wasn't sleeping or eating properly and was constantly in tears. The management would say they followed the company formal disciplinary process correctly -but they did in actuality put her in a position to fail. I was actually very proud of her, as she mastered so many skills we thought she would find difficult, such as working on the tills, and she was very meticulous in everything she did, so she achieved a lot but this was not recognised. She is now petrified of getting another job.

Anyway, it has been good to speak of this. I hate to think of others with ASD having similar cruel experiences.  

Many thanks for your help.

Rona

Looks like a clear case of constructive dismissal/redundancy - the new management set her up to fail, regardless of a known disability. Has your friend kept evidence of what happened? Is there a trade union covering the kind of work she did. While perhaps not being a member they might nevertheless want to take issue with the employer to prevent it happening to anyone else.

She could go to Citizen's Advice Bureau for legal advice. Unfortunately it is now harder to get legal aid but some law firms will take this on on a no-win no fee basis. Also there may be a Community Advocacy Group near you, or a local NAS branch of parents group for autism.

Sometimes a local newspaper can be persuaded to take up the issue and pass it to a national paper, who could raise the profile of what happened

If you have any more details of what was done to remove her from her job, setting it down here might help increase awareness of what we know is going on.

If she is on benefits as a result, someone at DWP/DHSS/Job Centre should have advised her about unfair dismissal when signing on.

There have been some high profile recent cases concerning autism. One was a golf club where a man with autism was employed as a green keeper, but subjected to humiliating treatment, for which he won a substantial award. The other recent one was someone employed as a waiter in a restaurant, where the chef maltreated him making out unfair claims about his autism and underpaying him - again very substantial compensation.