Colleague has thrown everything away that was on my desk

YANBU
It sounds like he is trying to assert himself/ ‘marking his territory’ in inappropriate ways and you are the latest target. I hesitate to suggest this, as I hate confrontation, but you need to say something. To avoid him choosing you as an easy target again you’ll need to make clear this is not to happen again.

Yes, I agree, I have a clear desk as that is the way I like it but the desk is assigned to me so if I happened to leave a post it note or two on it and found them in the bin, I would think that's pretty rude. Recently, i have become aware of my chair being a different position and my screens being moved and my colleague told me that a new employee that only works in the office 5 hours a week has been sitting at my desk, she should actually be sitting near her line manager but she prefers our office as it is quieter. It is definitely not her desk though and I would be annoyed if the post it notes had gone in the bin! I am slightly annoyed that I have to readjust everything tbh especially as she shouldn't even be in our office but at the end of the day it is work and I don't own the office.

There are no managers? It’s a completely non-hierarchical structure?

Surely if it was in his way, he would put in a drawer? He is an arse.

😲 You have a sleeping bag in the office? Is this a joke?

In fact if there’s no HR or clearly defined manager, I’d have ripped the nasty scumbag a new one myself and then escalated to whoever hires and fires.

What a nasty piece of work. He seems to be targeting you deliberately. How long has he worked there?

Pretty obvious. What other reason would he have to deliberately try to upset the OP by doing something spiteful like that.

If no HR, escalate to the boss in writing, detailing the using the ladies toilets and graffiti as well if not done already.

Then so the same to him - bin his "shit"

Well who do you (both) report to? this guy is a colleague but not your boss - so discuss with whoever owns the company.

Moreover TELL the prick that what he has done is absolutely unacceptable to have done what he has done and he is NOT to touch your stuff, use your desk under any circumstances ever again. If HE has an issue with this, HE can take it up with the management/HR. The fucker

That’s awful, he should have just put all your papers in a folder.

He is totally in the wrong.

Even if there was a clear desk policy, which there was NOT, he would be wrong.

I have worked both systems, and even at senior partner level people would use my desk and never bin stuff.

I have NEVER seen a policy for clear desk which states other members of staff can enforce it. More like the management may clear it, more into a box, never a bin.

I sometimes use my colleagues desk when they're sick. We sit in groups of four so that's just more practical. It wouldn't occur to me to throw any of her stuff away but then I actually like my colleagues.
Also our company is very family friendly so having personal stuff on you desk is pretty normal.

“Imagine” is certainly the word here…

OP said her colleague may have had to use her desk to cover some of her work. Maybe that means files were saved to that machine rather than a shared drive he could access. Maybe a licence for particular software was allocated to that machine; or maybe it was simply only installed on certain machines. It’s not uncommon.

”Shared desks” implies a regular, ongoing arrangement, and nothing the OP has said implies this is the case.

How on earth have you come to that conclusion? 😂 she’s already said there’s no HR.

He did it to get back at you for having to cover your work while you were off sick, banking on you not making a fuss.

This is bullying and you should absolutely raise it with HR.

I don’t think I’ve ever worked anywhere where people DON’T have a few personal items on their desk.

A few bits of paper on someone’s desk would not be issue enough to make a normal person gather them up and put them in the bin when they could see they were personal notes, working there or not.

She also said he sometimes uses it in he OP. Which means it wasn’t just a one off. I know what I believe - I’m not going to blindly assume the OP is telling the whole truth just because.

Is your working desk a place for personal things?

Unless your company has a clear desk and/or a desk sharing/hot desking policy, he had no right to do that. You should complain to your manager as he sounds like a twat who did it on purpose to upset you.

I imagine the Hot Desk and OP is stuck in old ways of having her own. She said he sometimes uses the desk, not just a one off, so yes I would class that as sharing desks. What would you say it is?

OP confirmed it was her desk and he was just using it to pick up some of her work as she was off unexpectedly with flu.

He’s clearly a misogynistic arse, maybe an incel considering he takes over the ladies loo when he feels like it, and writes graffiti about someone’s chest. As you have no HR you and the other women should feel free to deal with him, although you surely must have a boss or a team leader you could report him to?

When I was working in an office, some colleagues had heaps of clutter or personal items at their desks. I can't actually imagine even touching or moving them never mind binning them. That is so beyond out of order.
He sounds like an absolute horror from your other posts.

There is a significant gap between “You shouldn’t have done that” and disciplinary action. If you really are a senior manager, you should know that.

Explain why you think it’s acceptable for a colleague to remove and destroy material from another colleague’s allocated desk.

Office battles rarely end with a clear winner. Play the long game, get on with your work and if he is as bad as you say he is, sooner or later he will hang himself.

he chucked away personal items. What those items are, is immaterial. Next desk along has betting slips etc. Why didn't he throw those away?
Because he was using OPs desk. But he didn't need to bin them, he could have put them to one side and not been an arsehole about it.

It's not rocket science.