Content note for discussion of suicide. Please take care and skip this piece if you need to. There are support links at the bottom of this page.
Recently, the Guardian reported on the inquest of Chloe Moffat, a 26-year-old personal assistant at the Treasury. Chloe had worked there for almost three years.; she loved her job, had an exemplary employment record, was in line for promotion, and had been awarded a bonus for good work (that she never found out about). She was called into a meeting with her line manager and a senior manager. She was given no notice of what the meeting was about, and no warning that the senior manager would be there. In the meeting she was told that an anonymous complaint had been made against her, and that her access to her director’s diary and email would be temporarily removed. She asked whether she would lose her job and was told that no outcome could be predicted. She asked, several times, for her best friend at work to join her, and was told this would be inappropriate. Witnesses described her as shocked, crying, and overwhelmed. The day after the meeting, Chloe took her own life.
The inquest continues and it is for the coroner to establish the facts and draw conclusions. However, the evidence reported so far describes decisions that many of us who work in investigations and staff or student conduct will recognise, because versions of them happen in our workplaces and institutions all the time.
Three days after that reporting, the UK Faculty of Public Health (FPH) published a discussion paper arguing that poorly conducted disciplinary investigations should be treated as a public health issue. The Guardian’s coverage of the paper drew the connection to Chloe’s death directly.
Safeguards were treated as optional because the meeting was ‘informal’
Asked why Chloe was not offered a friend, colleague, or trade union representative in the meeting, the senior manager told the court that any alternative attendee “would have made the meeting feel more formal”. Asked why Chloe was given no notice so that she could prepare, seek support, and respond, the answer was that “this could cause unnecessary stress”.
Keeping things informal can feel kinder, but informality meant something else in practice in this case; no notice of serious allegations, no chosen companion, no clear information about what was being decided or what would happen next. The protections that exist in formal processes were absent, while the consequences (suspended access to systems, an investigation being drafted, a reputation at stake) were very present. Chloe’s mother, Anne, has asked the Treasury to ensure that where serious misconduct is alleged, the matter is treated as formal from the outset and the person is informed of their rights.
Procedural justice is not only for reporting parties
This case is a reminder that the principles of procedural justice and trauma-informed practice also apply to people who face allegations. Procedural justice research tells us consistently that people can accept difficult processes, and even difficult outcomes, when they have a voice, when they understand what is happening, when the decision-maker is neutral, and when they are treated with dignity (Tyler, 2000). Almost every element on this list was missing from Chloe’s experience, as reported. She did not know the meeting was coming. She did not know the case against her in any detail, because the complaint was anonymous. She was denied the supporter she asked for. She left convinced she had lost her job, when the evidence has suggested that dismissal was unlikely; nobody told Chloe this because it was considered “unhelpful” at that stage.
A trauma-informed approach would not have removed the requirement to look into the complaint but it would have changed how. It would have recognised that being accused of misconduct is, for most people, a frightening and destabilising experience; shock, distress, and catastrophic thinking are common responses and not necessarily signs of ‘guilt’; and support, clarity, and honest information should be part of the process from the start. People who feel safe enough to engage in a formal process are more likely to give better, fuller accounts, and facilitate more robust outcomes.
The scale of the problem
The FPH paper, drawing on Acas research, notes that UK employers run around 1.7 million disciplinary cases a year, at an estimated cost of £28.5 billion to the economy, mostly through the dismissals and resignations that follow. The faculty’s president, Professor Tracy Daszkiewicz, describes processes that are “applied in ways that prioritise procedure over people”, and argues that this mechanistic application is what causes damage; the harm ripples out to colleagues, to trust in systems, and to sickness absence and retention. The paper also notes that managers who are asked to run investigations can become “second victims” of the process, carrying extra workload, emotional strain, and the risk of grievances against them, often with little training or support.
The FPH’s central recommendation is that disciplinary investigation should be a last resort, guided by a principle of avoiding employee harm, an approach pioneered at Aneurin Bevan University Health Board in Wales, where it reportedly reduced investigations by 71 per cent and prevented more than 3,000 sick days a year. Acas agrees, and says early informal resolution should usually come first.
Informal resolution, done well, means a genuine attempt to resolve a concern through conversation, with no hidden consequences attached and what Chloe experienced was not that. It was a meeting with formal consequences (an allegation put to her, access to systems removed, an investigation being drafted) that was delivered without any of the safeguards that formality ought to carry. The question is not only whether a process is formal or informal, but whether the seriousness of what is happening to a person is matched by the information, support, and protections they are given. A mismatch in either direction has the potential to do harm.
Support arrangements need to be real, not nominal
The court also heard that Chloe’s line manager was assigned as her “pastoral care”, and that Chloe was told not to speak to friends about the allegations; a line manager involved in the disciplinary conversation cannot realistically be the person a member of staff turns to for support about that same conversation as these roles conflict. And instructing someone in distress not to talk to their friends removes the most protective resource most of us have. Confidentiality expectations can be explained in ways that do not isolate people. If your process separates someone from their support network at the exact moment they most need it, the process is creating risk.
Questions to ask in your own institution
Universities and other employers reading the coverage might reasonably ask what it has to do with their own processes. However, wherever conduct processes exist, so do these questions.
- Do people facing allegations get clear, early information about what is alleged, what the process is, and what the realistic range of outcomes looks like?
- Are they told their rights, including the right to be accompanied, before the conversation rather than after it?
- Is ‘informal’ ever functioning as a way to have formal consequences without formal safeguards?
- Who provides support to each party, and is that person free of any conflicting role in the process?
- Is anyone assessing the welfare of both parties as the process moves along, rather than only at the start?
Prompted by the FPH paper: is formal investigation your last resort, or has it become your default? And who is looking after the people you ask to investigate; are they trained, supported, and given the time to do it properly?
Chloe’s Mum, Anne Moffat, told the court: “Our hope is that lessons will be learned. The risks must be recognised so no other family will experience a loss like this.”
The Treasury has said it is piloting new advice for staff involved in disciplinary matters and giving managers additional training. Hopefully that work is thorough and other organisations ask themselves the same questions without waiting for a tragedy of their own. A conduct process is unlikely ever to be a pleasant experience for anyone involved, and nobody can promise that it will be. What organisations can do is make sure that the people in their processes are kept informed, properly supported, and treated with dignity throughout.
🪧 If you need support
If you have been affected by anything in this piece support is available. Samaritansare on 116 123, free and at any time. You can text SHOUTto 85258 for free, confidential support by text, 24 hours a day. You can also call NHS 111 and select the mental health option to speak to a trained professional.
If you are going through a disciplinary process at work and want advice, Acasoffers a free helpline on 0300 123 1100, and your trade union representative can support you too.