A churchgoing mother has won a £20 000 unfair dismissal case after she was wrongfully accused of viewing hardcore porn at work.
Elaine Buckley, 50, has been married for almost 30 years and regularly fundraises in her local community. But in 2010 the finance manager was called into her boss’s office to explain why she had been looking at porn sites during working hours.
She strenuously denied the claims but her employers at Waters Edge Ceramics, a dental laboratory in Oldham, fired her for gross misconduct.
The mother-of-two said: “I was just horrified when they first told me of the allegations. I believe that what happens between a woman and a man or a man and a man or two women in their bedroom should be kept private between them.”
Mrs Buckley said that in November 2010 the company announced that redundancies would take place. A week later she exchanged cross words with Gemma Taylor, her boss’s daughter, who had been brought in as her line manager after finishing university.
The next day she was invited for a disciplinary meeting at which it was revealed that her computer had been used to view hardcore pornography. Despite her denials, she was sacked on December 17. But the employment tribunal in Manchester heard that the sites could have been accessed without Mrs Buckley’s knowledge or by other people who used her computer.
The hearing was told the company had no evidence that she had accessed pornography.
Employment judge Diana Kloss ruled that she had been unfairly dismissed and awarded her £20 000 in compensation. - Daily Mail