Bosses at a sexual abuse charity have been lambasted by an employment judge after a former CEO was forced out of her job.

Senior board members and current chief executives of Break the Silence were labelled evasive, disingenuous and “not credible” after giving evidence in the tribunal of Alison Tait, who has been awarded more than £17,000 for constructive dismissal.

Ms Tait resigned after being told unexpectedly that she would have to share her CEO role with another employee and that she was being investigated over a string of “vague” allegations.

Employment judge Peter O’Donnell criticised the charity’s handling of the situation, saying “this was a case of [Break the Silence] seeking to find as much as they could to criticise the claimant whether there was grounds to do so or not”.

Employment solicitor Lucinda Hunter, who represented Ms Tait, said: “Whilst our client takes satisfaction that her position was vindicated by the tribunal, she is saddened by the fact that due to the stance of the charity’s management she had to pursue matters this far.

“This resulted in valuable resources being diverted from the support of the vulnerable women that the charity was set up to protect.”

The tribunal heard that Ms Tait volunteered with the charity – which supports survivors of rape and childhood sexual abuse – from 2006 and was appointed CEO in 2015.

However, things began to sour in August 2019 when chair Marilyn Cairns and vice-chair Lynn Burns offered a vote of thanks at the AGM to everyone but Ms Tait.

Later that month, Ms Cairns and Ms Burns met with the organisation’s current joint CEOs Lesley Craig and Sharon Belshaw to discuss Ms Tait.

The following day, she was told that a co-CEO role was being created and would be filled by Ms Craig.

The move prompted concerns among other board members and a meeting was called to discuss the decision.

However, after concerns were raised by Ms Cairns and Ms Burns, it was agreed that Ms Tait - who was off sick at the time - would be suspended and an independent legal firm appointed to carry out an investigation.

Ms Tait was never informed about her suspension and instead, weeks later, she received a letter from a law firm detailing an investigation into claims of mismanagement, many of which the tribunal found the charity had provided no evidence of.

After receiving the letter, Ms Tait resigned from her post on September 27.

She told the tribunal that she felt forced to resign following the unexpected creation of the co-CEO role, her suspension, and the investigation by the law firm.

Judge O’Donnell said that while there was no suggestion that Ms Tait was being demoted or would lose money, “any manager who was in charge of an organisation would consider that they had been as good as demoted if they were told that they were to have their responsibilities and authority shared with someone who, until that point, had been their deputy”.

He added that the board’s decision to suspend Ms Tait, and her never being informed of that decision, “does not reflect well on the charity and those individuals involved”.

While the issues in the legal letter were “so vague and presented without context, having never been raised as an issue with the claimant before, that it would be impossible for any reasonable employee to understand what was to be investigated”.

Where evidence in the case was in dispute, the judge said he preferred Ms Tait’s version.

He described Ms Cairns as “not credible”, Ms Burns as “evasive” and said that both Ms Craig and Ms Belshaw (the charity’s current co-CEOs) were “disingenuous”.

Break the Silence refused to comment when approached by The Herald.