{"id":4918,"date":"2016-09-28T10:17:30","date_gmt":"2016-09-28T10:17:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/simplylaw.waydevelopers.com\/england-wales\/wiki\/confidential-information-and-gross-misconduct\/"},"modified":"2023-11-04T13:12:06","modified_gmt":"2023-11-04T13:12:06","slug":"confidential-information-and-gross-misconduct","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/simply.law\/england-wales\/articles\/confidential-information-and-gross-misconduct\/","title":{"rendered":"A breach too far?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"justify\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>In <i>Farnan v Sunderland Association Football Club\u00a0<\/i><\/span><span>the High Court has provided a useful example of what can be considered gross misconduct in relation to the misuse of confidential information.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><b><span><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\">Facts<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><span><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\">Mr Farnan was the International and National Marketing Director for Sunderland Football Club. After a lengthy saga involving many twists and turns, the club summarily dismissed him without notice, having suspended him and trawled through his work emails.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><span><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\">The club pinned the dismissal on a number of matters including:<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>alleged breaches of confidence, including sending numerous emails to his personal email address and wife\u2019s email address<\/span>;<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>sending confidential information to other parties (including the club\u2019s ex vice-chairman, David Miliband);<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>sending a lewd email attaching a Christmas card showing ten women with their breasts exposed with the title \u2018Breast wishes for Christmas\u2019; and<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>making derogatory comments about his colleagues.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span>The Court dismissed most of the allegations as lacking the requisite character to amount to gross misconduct but found that Mr Farnan had committed serious and repeated breaches of contract by &#8216;banking&#8217; confidential information about sponsorship bids, which he sent to his wife&#8217;s private email, purportedly for administrative support but in fact to keep evidence if he ever ended up in litigation with the club.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\">Mr Farnan had also used confidential bid documents for his own purposes in seeking employment, briefed a journalist against clear club policy, and wrongly disclosed a sponsorship agreement to a third party. This was sufficient justification for dismissal without notice.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><span><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\">The Court did however, criticise the club for trumping up part of its case against Mr Farnan. Notwithstanding those criticisms, Mr Farnan\u2019s claim for breach of contract\/wrongful dismissal was accordingly dismissed.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><b><span><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\">Comment<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><span><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\">The case is a useful example of the types of misuse of confidential information that can amount to gross misconduct and a warning for employers who use the \u2018scattergun\u2019 approach by throwing every allegation they can think of at employees.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\"><i><span size=\"2\" style=\"font-size: small;\"><span face=\"Arial\" style=\"font-family: Arial;\">Farnan v Sunderland Association Football Club [2015] EWHC 3759 (QB)<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Farnan v Sunderland Association Football Club case shows what can be considered gross misconduct in relation to the misuse of confidential information.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7975,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_joinchat":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[12331,12329],"tags":[11623,10947,11622,11597],"class_list":{"0":"post-4918","1":"articles","2":"type-articles","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-employment-law-for-employees","8":"category-employment-law-for-employers","9":"tag-breaches-of-confidence","10":"tag-confidential-information","11":"tag-farnan-v-sunderland-association-football-club","12":"tag-gross-misconduct"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.4 (Yoast SEO v27.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>A breach too far? - Simply Law England Wales<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"&quot;Explore our comprehensive collection of legal articles covering various topics to help you navigate the complexities of the law. 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