My mum has worked for the last 30+ years for a religious (Christian) non-profit organisation. She's not paid by the organisation for her work; she raises her own funds by talking about her work at churches, and people who are on board with it can pledge to give her a monthly donation. The donations are made out to the organisation but specified for her. The organisation takes a 10% cut to cover their admin costs, and then deposits the remainder into her bank account. On paper, and for tax purposes, she's considered self-employed (on the advice of HMRC). But for all other intents and purpises she's a de facto (?) employee of this organisation - she works in their office, has a boss within the organisation who assigns her duties and signs off her annual leave, is bound by their policies, etc.
Recently, the organisation employed a new director who has been making some changes, one of which is to "clean up" some of the staffing. My mum has been variously told that her role is being restructured and there will no longer be a position for her, that they're upgrading to new software and they don't anticipate that she'll be able to adapt, and after that, that she "looks too miserable" and will probably have to go. She hasn't been given a timeframe for when she will be asked to leave, but they've made it clear she will be.
Because she's not officially employed by them, she's (presumably) not protected by employment law. She's also not part of any trade union. There is an HR department in the organisation - but they're the ones asking her to leave, so she can't appeal to them for help.
I realise her situation vis her employee status is very unusual but does anyone have any insight into her rights here? Can they really ask her to leave after so many years service with no good reason? She's dedicated her career to this organisation at significant personal cost, and is pretty devastated that they would screw her over right at the end of her career.
(Sorry for the long post and for (mis)using the AIBU topic for traffic!)