Management Beware! No Warnings Allowed

Another judgment of interest was published on the 20th October 2005 by the First Hall of the Civil Court in the names of Stefan Attard vs Fgura Local Council. This judgment concerned the request for compensation of an employee for the remainder since his contract of employment for a fixed term had been terminated.
 
We have seen many judgments of similar breed but this particular judgment struck me as the court reiterated an interesting concept in that Management does not need to be officially warned in writing that his employment is at jeopardy prior to being fired. In this particular case, as is the common practice, the employee (who was de facto a clerk) was verbally advised on various occasions that his performance has to improve but these conversations led nowhere. No written warnings were ever given to him. The employee was then discussed at board level and was requested to put forward his version of the facts, but the employee declined to oblige. He was subsequently dismissed for lack of performance.
 
The court stated that due to his status, the wrong attitude towards his superiors, his lack of performance overall and the fact that the employee did not fit into the employer's workplace was enough to dismiss the employee, although no written warnings were given and the employee was never officially warned that his employment was in jeopardy. Although the decision is a strange one because the employee was in fact a clerk and not an employee of management level, the reasoning of the court can easily be applied to other cases where the dismissal of management is being considered.