To appeal or not to appeal - TUPE

Apologies if this question has been asked many times but I am new to this site and need some advice.

Yesterday I was made redundant after working for my current employer for 10 years. The reasons for the redundancy fall under TUPE as we merged with another company.
The 4 of us in our department where told we be affected and there would be 2 new roles created. The two new roles that were created were VERY similar (as in the only difference in job title was the word inter-company added at the beginning).

It turns out that the manager in the department was offered a job seperatlely from us other 3 so there would be 1 role and 3 candidates. We were told that the selection process would be by way of an interview and previous experience, attendance and capaility would not play a part even though I am in a senior role over the other candidates.

The job description we were supplied with was very brief, basically because they didn't really know what the job would entail as it was new and the stucture of the company would be changing going forward.

I was told in my 2nd consultation meeting that I was unsuccessful as the other 2 candidates scored higher than me in two areas. 1) preperation-the other candidates brought facts and figures with them. (had he spoken to my line manager he would realise that the other two have figures to report on a monthly basis whereas I don't and 2) he picked on the fact that in my interview I was honest and open and said that in the past one of my weaknesses was that I can get frustrated when on the phone to customers. I only said this as I panicked and didn't really know what else to say. It was something that happened a long time ago but was the first thing that came to mind. Afterall I haven't had an interview for 10 years. In my meeting I did try and defend myself and explain that I hadn't had an appraisal for about 18 months and was out of the loop as I had been off on maternity leave.

My main concerns really are that it was soley an HR bod who conducted the interview. When in the interview we were told that he would be doing the interview as if we were an external person applying for the role. The HR bod has no clue as to our job roles, day to day tasks and the relationships we have we customer and colleagues.
I feel he based the decision on very petty and small reasons and felt that I was at a disadvantage due to me not having had an interview for so long where the other 2 candidates had only been at the company for 2-3 years.
He had no input from line managers with regards to capability for the new role and after speaking to colleagues, all of which were shocked the role was not offered to me, I have a better understanding going forward than the people selected for the role.

My biggest issue with the whole situation is that the person who has been selected for the role has currently been off sick for 6 weeks (and counting) for a pregnancy related issue. I know that they cannot discriminate against her for being pregnant (I myself have not long been back from maternity leave) but as she is currently not in she has not had the full picture to what changes the company are currently going through. The new role is due to start on 1st January but she is due to go on maternity leave on 23rd december and as far as I know is planning to be off for 9 months. Surely they wouldn't really want to offer the role to someone who won't be there for the first 9 months of it?

Originally there was talk of temp roles but now they are backtracking and won't commit to anything reagarding this.

Basically i'm after some advice on whether I should appeal the decision. I am aware that this probably will not reverse the decision and just because the person is pregnant it shouldn't mean they shouldn't be offered the role but I honestly feel that the selection criteria was weak and I wasn't given an opportunity to defend myself. There was one interview that lasted just over an hour and now my whole 10 year service has been wiped out.

They have offered quite a good package for redunancy and a compromise agreement if I stay until the end of the year which is little compensation considering the circumstances.

Any advice, help or tips are very much appreciated. Thank you for taking the time to read my post

Do appeal the decision if you feel it was unfair. It doesn't sound like a particularly good procedure, very bizarre to have HR alone doing interviews, for a start.

But be careful in terms of your pregnant colleague. You say 'surely they wouldn't really want to offer the role to someone who will be off for 9 months', but as I am sure you know, deciding not to offer her the role because she is going on maternity leave would be blatant and illegal discrimination. Her pregnancy cannot be taken into account, and if her sickness absence is pregnancy-related, that can't be taken into account either.

Be careful because it sounds as though you think they should discriminate against your colleague. If you appeal on that basis they will simply say they can't discriminate and that will be that.

Appeal the decision by all means, but focus on the procedure they used and selection criteria that are actually important, like skills, experience, performance at interview, disciplinary record, absence record (not including pregnancy-related sickness) etc