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No compensation for injury to feelings in unfair dismissal
Another case that demonstrates the limits of an unfair dismissal claim is the well-known House of Lords decision in Dunnachie v Kingston-upon-Hull City Council. This case established that unlike a claim for discrimination or harassment under the Equality Act 2010, a successful claim for unfair dismissal will not entitle the worker to compensation to injury to feelings or psychiatric injury — no matter how appalling the treatment by the employer:
Christopher Dunnachie originally won £10,000 at an employment tribunal for mental distress after he suffered a period of harassment from his line manager at Hull City Council. The council failed to recognise or deal with the situation, and Dunnachie was forced to find a lower-paid job in another council to escape the bullying. He then resigned and made his claim for unfair dismissal, backed by UNISON. An employment tribunal found his experience to have been so bad that it awarded him the maximum compensation under the law at the time. However, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) later stripped him of the award for psychiatric damage. The case reached the House of Lords (now the Supreme Court) who confirmed that compensation in claims for unfair dismissal does not include injury to feelings or psychiatric injury.
Dunnachie v Kingston-upon-Hull City Council [2004] IRLR 727