Is this unfair dismissal?

[snackattack]

My dh has worked for a high wealth, high profile celebrity for 14 years. He has been second in command for years and at Christmas his boss retired and we fully expected him to take over. However, despite being give a great Christmas bonus and a significant pay increase, the celeb decided to bring in another guy, out of the blue, to run the show. This person is same age as dh and he feels he was overlooked but was willing to accept it. However, it became clear that this new guy was learning dh's job - he spent a month sitting with him and then, out of the blue, yesterday he's called to a meeting and told that his job is likely to become redundant because the new guy can do his job.....this can't be fair!?? Clearly they are going through the "consultation" stage but it's clear as there's only a few employees that there's nothing else on the table and he's being pushed out even though his job has not disappeared. Can they really do this to him??
Please help - at end of our tether!

If I've got my facts right, what they've done with 'overlooking' him is fair - employment law does not include any entitlement to promotion, nor any requirement to advertise roles publicly.

Employers can employ who they want without opening it up to others - except in a situation where there are people under notice of redundancy (ie: have had an 'at risk' letter or a redundnacy notice) in which case, anyone transferable to an equivalent role has to be offered the role (if there is one job and two suitable candidates under redundancy notice, then both are supposed to be given the opportunity to apply.

Your DH was not under notice of redundancy at the time the new guy came in, so that is not applicable here.

A redundnancy scenario only relates to where the work done is no longer required. They can't actually make him redundant, and employ someone else to do the same work. If the work exists, then his post exists, he is the postholder and he would therefore have a case for unfair dismissal. Unless there is a restructure taking place, which it sounds like there might be ie: rolling of work into another person's role.

With the limited information you've provided, my questions would be:

Is the meeting that has just happened considered a 'redundancy consulation' where he has been told specificually that his post is at risk.

What is is his legislative period of notice (and if different) what is his contractual notice period , based on time served.

What is his contractual redundancy pay due, and his statutory redundancy pay due (if different)?

I think if this does come to your DH's role being made redundant, I would be looking at appealling and asking for how they came to be making his specific role redundant.

DWP site

I think they could argue that the job your DH was doing no longer exists, as it is now rolled into someone else's role. Or that they need to cut costs, so they need to cut staff numbers.

flowery will be able to help, I expect.

ooh this is a strange one and beyond me - it is a clear replacement/hope you move out strategy and also sounds like a big mouth has said he/she can do everything which is real muscling in.

As its a celebrity case, I would imagine there might be a big of advantage in playing hardball I would definitely consider your dh networking like buggery - is he handling the celebrity eg agent etc or just second in command of a celebrity businessmans' main concern?

i would guess the egos involved will be pretty big and posturing - and the press issue will help with bargaining - but if the real agenda is that he wanted the job a) this heavy bargaining might do no good but also b) has he told said celebrity that he definitely wants the top job and its outrageous etc?

I saw a recent CEO battle where five board members wanted the job but were so darned polite and political about 'not wanting to be seen to want the job' that the board got exasperated and drafted someone in - cue lots of aggressive 'I wanted that damn job' and lots of 'well you should have said'!

this needs lots of different types of help especially re legalities of this.

Hmmm.

As hairy said, there is no obligation to promote internally or even advertise roles either internally or externally, so your DH has no legal complaint that he should have the top role. Neither is age a relevant factor (you mention the new guy is the same age).

So on the face of it, there was a manager and a deputy manager (we'll call them). Manager left. New manager appointed. Employer then decides (on the face of it although in reality probably had already decided), that he/she doesn't in fact need both a manager and a deputy manager, and decides that in fact s/he can manage without the second in command position as one person can run things without support.

If your DH could argue that the one remaining role going forwards is in fact an amalgamation of both roles, somewhere in the middle in terms of seniority, responsibilities etc, he may then be able to argue that both employees should have been considered for the role, however it would be unusual in those circumstances for the more junior candidate (in terms of existing seniority) to get the role anyway, so even if he could argue that, it probably wouldn't help at all.

But it sounds as though it's one of those morally unfair things, but not unfair dismissal. It's perfectly reasonable as a business decision for an employer to decide they want to strip out one level of management, which on the face of it is all they've done.