AIBU to consider legal action after dismissal for long-term sickness?

This thread has become pointless now. People debating what ocd means. Start a new thread and debate it. It is taking away from ops question. Ffs

@Velumental He's not a person with OCD. He's a clinical psychologist with extensive experience of treating it.

The knife to the throat thing, which tbf I could have explained better, is part of a treatment called Exposure and Response prevention, where someone with OCD will, with support, confront situations they've been avoiding and refrain from carrying out compulsions.

Sometimes ERP goes further than most people would go in everyday life. The idea is that the further you go the more you can counteract the worry about something awful happening.

If I'm checking all my plug sockets before leaving the house, for example, becuase I'm scared of causing a fire. I might deliberately leave them on when I go out. I might leave the oven and the lights on too. It's not reckless risk taking - I wouldn't leave my hair straighteners on - just pushing hard against OCD.

ETA As part of the treatment, Prof Salkovskis invites patients with harm OCD to hold a knife against HIS throat. He is not holding knives to anyone's throat!!

She's not claiming to know better. She's telling you his expression of his mental health is harmful and traumatising to others. You don't get to traumatised others because of your mh

Whatever his name is Professor Paul Salkovskis, who is one of the U.K's leading experts on OCD and has been working with people with OCD for upwards of 30 years.

But, sure, you know better🙄

People aren't disagreeing with you. They're saying that employers can't take that risk without failing their duty of care.

Of course I’ll stop 🫡

I work for a union but I can't advise in full here, of course.

Initial thought would be to appeal with medical evidence disputing the OH report that seems to be the basis for the dismissal. A letter from your psychiatrist would be helpful.

I would also question why the final meeting wasn't deferred until your rep returned from annual leave. Did you ask about this? You should have had the right to be accompanied and could have requested a reasonable postponement.

At the end of the day, op said ocd takes up alot of her day and there is no end in sight! This ties in with oc health.. not fit to return in the foreseeable. If the question was can they dismiss based on this info from oc health along with absence length then absolutely. But employer still needs to follow a fair process.
However would op win a tribunal? No one can answer that. We are getting one side of a story. A story that has holes.
Op, if you disagree with the decision then please appeal.

The op mentions asd and communication styles being misinterpreted. I have asked for more info as that could be useful/relevant. I imagine starting a thread like this and then answering lots of questions whilst other ops are telling op they are a bad employee and sharing misinformation about ocd would be overwhelming. Hence why op isn't being very forthcoming.

My opinion, I think you should exhaust appeal process. Speak to union, ensure they attend the appeal meetings with you and also speak to acas. But please give accurate information so they can give you the best advice.

Its impossible to know if you have a claim as this is all quite confusing and I think we aren't getting all necessary information. Id be wary sharing lots of information online as it could be triggering further ocd! Ie my ocd is triggered when I am anxious.

The OPs opening question was whether she should take legal action for being dismissed as a result of a chronic condition that doesn’t look like improving soon.
It’s totally irrelevant to the question, what the condition is because it could be anything from cancer to having both legs amputated, if it prevents you from working then legally, through the correct process her employer can dismiss her.
They would need to have evidence that the OP is not going back to work soon. As long as the evidence is provided by the correct agency then they can proceed.
For some reason PPs are banging on about OCD which may be only part of her problem. There is insufficient evidence to comment on this.
Safeguarding includes all sorts of possibilities, and is not necessarily focused on the intrusive thoughts the OP expressed to her boss. It’s quite possible that the boss has kept that information to themselves. Safeguarding the workforce from burnout because they are having to pick up the slack is a bigger issue. The longer it goes on and the uncertainty it creates could lead to other staff members taking sick leave.
I think we can safely conclude from the posters who insist on repeating their message about OCD they have personal experience of the condition. We get it but it is not relevant to the original post, since the OPs dismissal was on the grounds of ill health not OCD specifically.

The OP said occupational health said not fit for work and she herself said she wouldn’t be anytime in the future. So whether or not work would allow or want a phased return is irrelevant. As it stands, she is not fit for any work phased or otherwise. This is most likely why she was let go.

I guess the worry is (intensified by the batshit responses on this thread) that they might not want to give OP a chance with a phased return etc because they are erroneously afraid of her like half the people on this thread seem to be. That might not be the case and it might be that she is incapable of doing the actual tasks but if she had been a good employee before and is engaged in treatment to get better it seems pretty harsh.

It most assuredly is not “illegal to sack someone with a disability”, op.
If you mean sack someone because of their disability, then that’s correct, but it’s clear that that’s not what happened here.

We spend a lot of time in OCD therapy trying to get people to challenge ‘thought action fusion’. Having an unacceptable thought or even saying it out loud does not create a risk. Thoughts are not risky. I understand that the manager wanted to make a risk assessment but presumably that would be done by occupational heath and a a qualified professional would reassure them there is no risk.

I would 100% go out with a man who had thoughts of harming people even children in the context of diagnosed harm OCD for which they sought treatment. I would be happy for my daughter to as well. I advise my patients not to disclose their symptoms apart from to very trusted people however because of the attitudes on this thread.

Anyway it’s not the reason OP lost her job. That is more to do with excessive sickness absence which is factual and therefore hard to challenge.

You said the reason for dismissal was that your ocd was still taking up a lot of your day and you were unfit for the role

You think doctors are all knowing? Why on earth do you think a GP would know better than an OT? A professional trained in assessing someone’s fitness for a specific job?

This is a common and very stigmatising misunderstanding of harm OCD

People with harm OCD thoughts absolutely do not act on them. They fear that they will and they take unnecessary steps to stop themselves but they are not any risk to others.

There was no argument. The PP was being rude so I was rude back.

The most ignorant comment ever. Recommend you read up on it. Absolute nonsense.

Don’t be so vicious.

It’s a rude response used when losing an argument. Best ignored.

DFOD?

Because she’s convinced her disability will overrule the fact that she simply isn’t doing her job even when she’s actually there, which is seldom enough.

At times I was in hospital. I could not help that.
So DFOD

Bet your colleagues love you for that. A real player.’

@KittyCoo

Several people now have asked what you meant when you said that your OCD takes up much of your day.

It is that which will underpin the decision that you are not capable of fulfilling your role. And yet you keep ignoring it. Why?