Court confirms John Bundy unfair dismissal from PBS while halving payout

An appeals court has confirmed that John Bundy was unfairly dismissed as Public Broadcasting Services CEO, but slashed compensation owed to him by half.

In a judgment delivered yesterday morning by Mr Justice Lawrence Mintoff, the court ordered a total of €113,244 to be given to Bundy in compensation. This is half the total amount of €226,488 which was awarded in the original ruling in February.

Judge Lawrence Mintoff found that PBS officials had acted irresponsibly and were not up to their jobs, but that Bundy could also not claim to be unfamiliar with public procurement rules.

In February, Bundy won an unfair dismissal case he had filed before the industrial tribunal after he was sacked as CEO of the Public Broadcasting Services in 2017. Bundy was sacked by the PBS board after an audit had concluded that he had breached procurement regulations in a €500,000 car lease deal. The audit had also found that Bundy had “consistently bullied” the senior management.

The tribunal had found in his favour that PBS had only started an internal investigation into Bundy two months after its board too a vote of no confidence in him. It also found that Bundy’s termination was based on an RSM report, a report which noted certain inconsistencies in the testimony of people who testified against Bundy.

After the tribunal which upheld Bundy’s claim and awarded him almost a quarter of a million euro in compensation, PBS filed an appeal.

On Wednesday, in its decision, the appeals court noted that Bundy had flagged concerns about the way PBS was handling its financial affairs from his very first weeks as CEO.

The company was earning nothing in return, Bundy had noted, but it was spending thousands of euro on lunches in a particular restaurant, Malta’s Eurovision Song Contest participation and other events.

Problems with the management were abundant and apart from clashes over programme scheduling, the court noted that management “was absolutely not up to the important role they occupied.”

The court stated that through proper practices, this situation could have been avoided and Mintoff said that “the court finds it very difficult to believe that no one on the board of directors was aware of the process that was launched for the acquisition of new vehicles.”

Throughout the ordeal, Bundy was not given the opportunity to defend himself since he was fired without any disciplinary proceedings.

When PBS requested a variation in the compensation due, Bundy requested that the compensation owed to him be determined in accordance to the law. In other words, half of what he would have been owed.

Throughout the final submissions of the case, Bundy’s lawyers put forward a clause in his contract which stated that he was to be compensated with the full amount as agreed in his contract.

Given that the tribunal had to decide on the original request, the compensation to Bundy was brought down to €113,224.

Bundy was represented by lawyers Matthew Brincat and Lara Pace while PBS was represented by lawyers Franco Galea, Marisa Vella and Christine Calleja.