By Grâçia Ada Obi
A mum has won a payout of more than £28,000 after she was laid off due to her pregnancy. Nikita Twitchen was preparing to return from maternity leave when building services firm First Grade Projects decided to dismiss her because she was expecting another baby.
The Pontypridd-based business, a sponsor and building services partner of Swansea City football club, hired Ms Twitchen in October 2021 as an office administration assistant. She described her working relationship with the 49-year-old managing director Jeremy Morgan as “very good”. They got on well and he was “very responsive” when she needed to speak to him, she told an employment tribunal.
Shortly after starting the job Ms Twitchen became pregnant, beginning maternity leave in June 2022. The following year, on February 17, she attended a return-to-work meeting with Mr Morgan. The tribunal heard the meeting “started positively” with Mr Morgan saying the business was doing well and had recently secured a contract with the NHS. He said he was looking forward to Ms Twitchen coming back and they agreed the hours she would work on her return.
But towards the end of the meeting Ms Twitchen revealed she was pregnant again. The tribunal heard this “came as a shock” to the boss, who later claimed he had congratulated Ms Twitchen, which she denied. When her maternity leave came to an end on March 26, no-one from First Grade contacted her to confirm her return to work. She had expected to come back on April 3 but had to chase for a response to her message to Mr Morgan. Eventually he messaged her: “It’s best to leave it until you have your routine in place.”
On April 4 she asked Mr Morgan about holiday entitlement for later in the year but he “failed to respond substantively”, which was out of character, the tribunal heard. Ms Twitchen sent a chasing message on April 11 and again on April 18. Later that day Mr Morgan phoned her to say she was being made redundant because of financial difficulties and delays in some payments to the business. He later claimed new software was being installed which meant her role “would no longer exist”. He also claimed a workshop manager had been made redundant earlier that year, which Ms Twitchen had heard nothing of previously.
At the time of the return-to-work meeting Ms Twitchen was eight weeks pregnant. Employment Judge Robin Havard said she should be “commended” for working from June to October 2023 at a launderette and a caravan park. She cleaned caravans in the summer “in very hot conditions, travelling 45 minutes each way, up until she was 39 weeks pregnant”, said the judge, who added that Ms Twitchen needed a job for her family’s financial stability.
The judge also noted that Mr Morgan had made no mention of financial difficulties or redundancy at the February meeting, and in fact had said the business was doing well. Even in the April phone call he did not mention any new software. The judge criticised First Grade’s failure to “produce any evidence of the alleged financial difficulties or of the new software” during the court case. At no stage did Ms Twitchen receive a written statement setting out the reasons for her dismissal.
Ms Twitchen noticed that since her dismissal the company had rebranded itself, hired people and invested in vehicles. The judge said these revelations “cast doubt” on Mr Morgan’s claim that the company was in financial difficulty. From record displayed, has seen Companies House records that show First Grade had retained earnings of £125,586 in 2023 and £61,231 in 2022.
Judge Havard found that Ms Twitchen was dismissed because she was pregnant. The judge took into account Mr Morgan’s “change of attitude” after learning of the pregnancy, the change in his “speed of response” to messages, and the “complete lack of any coherent evidence-based alternative explanation” despite ample opportunities to provide one.
The judge concluded the dismissal of Ms Twitchen was unfair, discriminatory, and must have caused her “real anxiety and distress over a period of time, having been dismissed when pregnant and losing her sense of financial security with all the family responsibilities that she had”. Judge Havard ordered First Grade and Mr Morgan to pay compensation totalling £28,706.
First Grade Projects — listed at Companies House under the name Genu Prima Limited — had a workforce of 14 people, the tribunal heard. The business, which is Swansea City’s back-of-shorts sponsor, said in a statement: “We are extremely disappointed with the outcome of the tribunal. We are actively reviewing all relevant information and considering all available options. At this point in time we are unable to provide any further comment.”