Posted: Friday 17 June 2011
Charity Man Sacked For Running At A Snail’s Pace
Following my recent blog on mascots , I thought I would blog on a recent quirky news story on the BBC News website. Lloyd Scott crawled the London Marathon back in May dressed as Brian the Snail from the Magic Roundabout. Mr Scott took 26 days to complete the marathon – crawling a mile a day.
Mr Scott had hoped to raise about £100,000 for Action for Kids, the charity he worked with. However, Mr Scott only managed to collect about a fifth of that, £20,000, blaming the recession on his inability to raise sponsorship.
Action for Kids let Mr Scott go on the basis that they incurred losses due to publicity and support as a result of his participation in the Marathon. The charity has stated that it provided Mr Scott with notice in terms of the contract.
So, where does this leave Mr Scott? It is unclear what Mr Scott’s role at the charity was and whether or not he was paid for his time there. If he was an employee (and he may well not have been) it may be that he had less than a year's service and therefore would be unable to raise an unfair dismissal claim in most circumstances. If he did have over a year's service and he was an employee, then, depending on the circumstances surrounding the dismissal and Mr Scott’s contract of employment, he might well have a claim for unfair dismissal unless he had previously received warnings.
The dismissal has created some negative publicity for the charity which is something that employers should always bear in mind when considering dismissal.
