Ford Retail Ltd T/a TrustFord

Case Summary

The claimant applied for interim relief in relation to whistleblowing claims. The tribunal rejected the application, finding that although the claimant disclosed information about a breach of legal obligation, he did not reasonably believe the disclosure was in the public interest as it concerned only his personal health conditions rather than the respondent's handling of health conditions across its wider workforce.

The tribunal concluded the claimant did not meet the 'likely to succeed' test required for interim relief because he failed to demonstrate a reasonable belief that his disclosure was in the public interest, as he raised concerns only about his own personal health conditions rather than systemic disability discrimination affecting other employees.

• •whether claimant made a protected disclosure under s43B ERA
• •whether claimant had reasonable belief disclosure fell within s43B(1) categories
• •whether disclosure was made in the public interest
• •whether dismissal was for protected disclosure under s103A ERA

1 EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNALS Claimant: Mr D Lee Respondent: Ford Retail Limited t/a TrustFord FULL WRITTEN REASONS 1. I explained my summary reasons for rejecting the claimant’s application for interim relief under s128 and s129 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 at the hearing on 11 March 2026. The judgment relating to the claimant’s application was sent to the parties on 12 March 2026. The claimant emailed the Tribunal on 13 March 2026 and requested written reasons. I decided that it would be appropriate to provide full written reasons given the limited nature of the decision made in an interim relief application in accordance with Rule 60(4E) of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024. 2. The claimant has another existing Tribunal claim (case reference 6043741/2025) which he presented to the Tribunal on 27 November 2025 containing disability discrimination complaints. 3. The task for the Tribunal on an interim relief hearing is to make a broad assessment on the material available to try to get an understanding of the evidence and to make a prediction of what is likely to happen at the eventual substantive hearing of these claims. In doing so, I am not making findings of fact relating to this claim. I must consider the documentary evidence that was made available to me during this hearing, together with the parties’ submissions. 4. I also note that Rule 95 of the Employment Tribunal Rules makes it clear that the Tribunal shall not hear any oral evidence during an interim relief hearing unless it directs otherwise. 5. The parties provided a considerable volume of documents to the Tribunal for my consideration (over 120 pages from the claimant and over 330 pages from the respondent). The respondent also provided a skeleton argument. I did not read every page of the documents sent to the Tribunal – it would simply have been impossible to do so, given that the time estimate for thi…