Unfair Dismissal ?? Final meeting 17/3/09

I am on redundancy notice and through the initial consultations. The dept I was part of was closed completely and a new dept formed eff 1/4/09. All roles in the new dept had to be re-applied except for the manager role that was already allocated when we were shown the FY09 structure in an open meeting. In the most recent org chart I was shown as 'Distribution Operational Management'. The new role is called 'Manager Distribution UK/IDS' which is strikingly similar. The new role is part of a management team, but there is no job description (requested over a week ago) and no interview & selection process. Although this would have been a promotion I have been undertaking my role for over 2 yrs and will be at the company 6 yrs exactly when my redundancy notice ends. I would have had a crack at it given the cahnce in an interview. My contract states that I must comply with the Company Employee Handbook and within that document it states 'all new roles will be advertised...', and I presume this would apply to all the companie's staff and officers ? I have a lot of support with my work colleagues and the distributors I worked closely with. Howver, the new post holder is a close friend of the new GM and I suspect the plans have been in motion a while. I applied for 1 of the 6 available roles in the new team, but they are sales roles so I was unsuccessful, as my role is primarily analytical and process based. In total 9 posts from around 75 are being made redundant.

Have they failed to follow a fair procedure or acted in a 'wrongful' manner by going down the 'jobs for the boys' route? My final meeting is Tuesday 17th at 10.30am so hope you can advise before then.

Thanks in advance.

Hi Kevin

Sorry I couldn't reply before your final meeting today. If, as you suspect, you have been made redundant, you shoudl follow the appeal procedure and raise your concerns through that route. It does seem unreasonable to expect you to out yourself fwd for a role without having a job desciption available. If the appeal doesn't work then I suggest you consider bringing a claim for unfair dismissal.

Your employer shoudl have followed the 3 step statutory procedure (see my guide http://www.etherington.co.uk/redundancy.shtml for details). If they haven't then the dismissal will be automatically unfair.

REgards

Pete