A Marine Section Officer who blasted his bosses for “bullying”, “collusion” and “shattering” his trust never actually resigned, a Tribunal has ruled — plunging the Public Services Commission into an embarrassing mess over how one of its own workers was pushed out of his job.
In a blistering decision handed down last week, the Employment and Equality Tribunal found that Stuart Dawson, who worked in the Department of Infrastructure’s Harbours Division, did not resign at all when he sent an email headed “Resignation” in September 2024. Instead, the Tribunal ruled, the message amounted to nothing more than notice of an internal transfer — and the Government should have known it.
Mr Dawson, a veteran and long‑serving government employee, had been off sick with stress for months when he fired off the now‑infamous email accusing Harbours management of bullying, collusion and destroying his career. He told them he was “disgusted”, “appalled”, and that the treatment he endured should “bring shame on the Department”. He believed he was leaving Harbours for a new job at the Prison Service — a move he thought required a resignation.
People in positions of power set out to collude together to get rid of me. – Dawson’s allegation
But the Tribunal found that behind the drama of the email lay a simple truth: Dawson’s employer was the PSC, not the DOI, and nothing in his message said he was quitting the PSC. In fact, HR knew he was trying to move internally. They even told him his annual leave would “carry over to the new role” — a detail the Tribunal said was entirely consistent with a transfer, not a termination.
The bombshell came when the Prison Service suddenly withdrew its conditional job offer in mid‑October, leaving Dawson stranded. He immediately tried to rescind his resignation, only to be told by DOI bosses that it was too late — even though, as the Tribunal noted, nobody had ever bothered to check whether he meant to resign from the PSC at all.
Management Failure
The Tribunal was scathing about management’s failure to clarify the obvious ambiguity. They knew Dawson was a PSC employee. They knew he was seeking a move. They knew internal transfers were common. Yet they treated his email as a full resignation and pushed him out the door.
The ambiguity was obvious — clarification was required. – Tribunal conclusion
The decision leans heavily on the landmark Levy case, where an NHS worker’s “notice” was ruled not to be a resignation because she was simply moving internally. The Tribunal said Dawson’s situation was “materially similar” — and that any reasonable, informed manager should have realised his intention was to switch roles, not end his employment.
The fallout is significant. Dawson remains unemployed, and the PSC now faces the prospect of defending an unfair dismissal claim without its primary argument. The ruling also exposes a glaring contradiction inside Government: Departments are legally separate, but PSC employees move between them all the time — a system the Tribunal described as “curious” and clearly misunderstood by managers.
For Dawson, the decision is vindication after months of turmoil. For the PSC and DOI, it is a public embarrassment and a warning shot about sloppy HR processes and the consequences of ignoring context.
The full unfair dismissal case will now proceed — and with this ruling in his favour, Dawson’s fight with the Government is far from over.
