Charity puts ‘bullying' suit to rest

A legal dispute between the chief executive of the hospitality industry's leading charity, Hospitality Action, and its former accountant, Conal Morgan, has been settled.

Chief executive Alison Rogers was accused at an industrial tribunal in Croydon of bullying Morgan out of his job. Morgan was claiming unfair dismissal.

Neither Rogers nor Rupert Choat, acting for Morgan, would comment. Rogers said: "We have come to an agreement but it is confidential."

Rogers denied allegations of forcing Morgan to quit. She told the tribunal, when it opened in February, she had had no choice but to fire Morgan because his work was not up to scratch.

He had been the charity's accountant for eight years.

She added that, as part of a reorganisation, many of his duties could be undertaken by a junior member of staff.

Morgan said that Rogers bullied him for a year before allegedly saying to him: "There are two routes, the disciplinary route or redundancy."

Rogers said she had lacked confidence in the standard of Morgan's work but had never bullied him. She denied having disliked Morgan (Caterer, 24 February, page 5).