29 May 2024
A judge has ruled the major vet firm was in breach of its contract with former clinical operations director Ciara McCormack over a dispute that led to her exit from the company two years ago.
Vet Times
Job Title
Ciara McCormack.
A former senior executive has won her legal battle against a major veterinary firm over her departure from the company.
Ciara McCormack sued Medivet for damages, alleging that the circumstances that led to her leaving the organisation in 2022 represented a breach of contract.
Lawyers for the firm disputed that and a newly published ruling on the case rejected her legal team’s allegation that the process that triggered her exit was “a sham”.
But the judgement, which follows a three-day trial in February, also found that the “essential elements” of her case against the firm had been successfully established.
The ruling continued: “If the company’s conduct was not calculated to undermine the relationship of trust and confidence with Dr McCormack, it ought to have been in little doubt that this was likely to be the consequence as, indeed, it was.”
Dr McCormack resigned from her role as director of clinical operations in July 2022, three months after she was advised of planned management structure changes that would have seen some of her duties given to others.
Although the company planned to appoint her as chief clinical officer, she felt she was unsuited to that role and a subsequent formal grievance argued she was being “forced out”.
Medivet insisted they were not seeking to replace Dr McCormack and the process was not found to have taken place with the “narrow” aim of removing her, but instead grew out of plans to develop the company’s European operations, which Dr McCormack had herself expressed interest in.
However, the judge did rule that Medivet was in breach of contract by failing to properly consult Dr McCormack about the plans or take her views into appropriate account.
The judgement also branded the efforts made to establish her views as “perfunctory”, criticised the failure to seek interim solutions to problems that were perceived and argued it was “fanciful” to suggest Dr McCormack would have been considered for an alternative role.
Dr McCormack, who is now chief executive of the Kin Vet Community, declined to comment on the case when approached by Vet Times.
However, Medivet’s chief people officer, Helen Clarke Smith, said: “We have received the judgement, and I want to take this opportunity to say that Medivet remains fully committed to building a better business and getting it right for all our colleagues, and we’re working hard to make sure every colleague feels as cared for as the animals they look after.”
The damages to be awarded to Dr McCormack will be determined at a later hearing.
