A GARDENER, writer and lifelong advocate for animals returned to Southampton Employment Tribunal this week and won a claim of discrimination against Orchard Park in Gillingham.

Joe Hashman, who used to write for the Blackmore Vale Magazine as Dirty Nails, persuaded the tribunal that his "few hours a week" job, creating and maintaining demonstration vegetable beds at the garden centre, had been "abruptly terminated" because of the attitudes of the company's board members and accountant to his animal rights activities. A previous hearing at the tribunal had decided these amounted to a philosophical belief under European employment legislation.

The three day tribunal was chaired by Judge Michael Coles, who told the hearing that the termination of Mr Hashman's work was capable of being discriminatory, and as such protected by the legislation. The respondents (Orchard Park, in the person of Richard Cumming) had not convinced the tribunal that there was no discrimination against Mr Hashman.

Following the finding the two sides reached a financial agreement between themselves, and Mr Hashman read a statement to the press saying that it had been an unfortunate business, that he had been happy working at Orchard Park, and that he wished Richard Cumming and his wife well. He had moved on, he said, and had not sought to be reinstated in the work.

Orchard Park, run on land owned by Ron and Sheila Clarke of neighbouring Park Farm, is owned by the Clarkes and by Richard Cumming and his wife Sue. The Cummings are minority shareholders in the business, whose company secretary is Lucinda Stokes, a former joint master of a local hunt. Sheila and Ron Clarke are also supporters of the hunt.

Joe Hashman and Richard Cumming met when the former "cold called" at the garden centre offering books by "Dirty Nails" for sale in the book department, on behalf of a friend. It was only later that Mr Cumming learned that Dirty Nails was Mr Hashman's own pseudonym.

Later Mr Hashman was invited by Mr Cumming to be the guest speaker at a meeting of the Orchard Park Gardening Club, but Mr Hashman was unable to do so. By this time (October 2008) Mr Cumming knew the identity of Dirty Nails, but it was under his writing name that he was to have been the "celebrity" guest to draw an audience, Mr Cumming told the tribunal.

The two men discussed the establishment of demonstration plots on unused land at the garden centre in autumn 2008, and the discussions firmed up early in 2009 with an exchange of emails detailing possible plans for planting areas of land.

Mr Hashman told the tribunal he believed this was an on-going scheme, which had to be undertaken gradually to allow for the preparation of the beds and other land, the growing and planting seasons and the various speeds of growth of plants.

Mr Cumming said that many aspects had been discussed. His idea had been to attract more customers to the garden centre and encourage them to "grow their own", with the attendant increase in sales of plants and equipment at the centre.

Mr Hashman, who already had a blog on his book publishers' website, asked his nephew to create a new blog about his work at Orchard Park, and this was linked to the garden centre's own website. On it he detailed his work at Orchard Park. He also mentioned the progress of the demonstration plots in his Dirty Nails column in the Western Gazette, suggesting that readers visit him at the Gillingham centre for advice.

Three plots were established, each demonstrating a different means of banishing weeds and pests. Mr Hashman then built three raised beds, using kits available from the garden centre, and began to plant them with vegetables, some of which were provided to the cafe in Orchard Park.

He had infrequent personal contact with the busy Mr Cumming, but emails indicated that the manager was happy with the work he was doing.

According to Mr Cumming's evidence to the tribunal, by late July in this difficult financial year, the monthly board meeting decided that the demonstration beds were not generating the additional income they had hoped, and that the project should be terminated by the end of September.

Mr Cumming did not pass this decision on to Mr Hashman, who was working a few hours each week on the plots.

In late June or early July the two men had discussed a previous relationship between Mr Hashman and Andrew Prater, who was farm manager at the adjoining Park Farm. Following this conversation, the delivery rota of meat from Park Farm to Orchard Park was slightly amended to ensure that Mr Prater did not come to Orchard Park on the day or days when Mr Hashman was working, to avoid potential conflict.

The two men also met, with their wives Zara and Sue, at Mr Cumming's home in Milton on Stour, where he had previously run a garden centre. They discussed whether Mr Hashman would cultivate plants for sale at Orchard Park, which was then buying its young plants from "up country". The idea was dropped when Mr Hashman said that Zara was developing her art work and he had decided to return to agricultural college at Kingston Maurward to increase his gardening expertise "beyond the vegetable comfort zone."

The Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show was held on 19th August 2009. Prior to the show Mr Hashman had written on his publisher's blog about his feelings about the publicity for the show with its "red-coated huntsmen and floppy-eared hounds."

On the morning of the show Mr Prater had suffered an accident while setting up pens, and had subsequently died from a pulmonary embolism.

His funeral was held at Motcombe Church, close to Orchard Park, and it was expected that his family and many friends would congregate at the centre before or after the funeral. For this reason, Mr Cumming emailed Mr Hashman to suggest he stay away on that day - Thursday 3rd September 2009 - when he would usually have been working on the plots.

Mr Cumming told the tribunal that he had been embarrassed to tell Mr Hashman that the vegetable plots had not been as financially profitable as had been hoped, and the work would end in September, and he was relieved that the gardener's return to college would minimise the blow.

At the same time as Mr Prater's funeral, there had been national newspaper reports of the conviction of celebrity chef Clarissa Dickson-Wright for attending an illegal hare coursing event. (Ms Dickson-Wright received an absolute discharge). This event had been covertly filmed by Mr Hashman, two years earlier, and he was a witness at the trial. The publicity surrounding the case at Scarborough Magistrates Court had been followed by Mr Hashman's appearance on Jeremy Vine's BBC 2 radio show.

After the funeral Mr Cumming attended a major trade show in Birmingham, and did not contact Mr Hashman, who then formed the opinion that his relationship with the late Mr Prater and his involvement in the high profile hare coursing case had inflamed feelings on the Orchard Park board.

From then on he made detailed notes of his telephone conversations with Mr Cumming, which were submitted to the tribunal. He had always kept all his email exchanges.

Mr Hashman, who was represented by London solicitors Bindmans and counsel Ivan Hare, told the tribunal he believed from the outset "we were embarking on a long term project."

Mr Cumming, represented by Martyn West for Peninsula Business Services, said that Mr Hashman was "never an employee in any sense of the word, but it had been expected that he would work on the plot throughout the summer and probably until the autumn, when activity would naturally wind down."

"The vegetable garden was an experiment, and there was no particularly measurable effect on the sales," the managing director of Orchard Park told the tribunal.

He produced a copy of minutes of the July board meeting, at which the decision was taken to stop the demonstration plots, but Mr Hashman said he took it "with a pinch of salt" as no other documentary evidence was submitted of the decision, and the format of the minutes was different from that of other board meetings.

Only Mr Hashman and Mr Cumming appeared at the tribunal. Witness statements from Ron and Sheila Clarke, Mrs Cumming and from Lucinda Stokes were submitted.

All denied any relevance of the Clarissa Dickson-Wright case, of which they said they were ignorant until Mr Hashman's proceedings were notified. They denied discriminating against the gardener on the grounds of his animal rights and anti hunting beliefs.

Their decision had been purely economic. The financial state of the business had been difficult - it had only just come out of "special measures" with the bank, and they needed to concentrate on revenue increasing projects.

Mr Hare said that the board minutes did not back up the claims of financial difficulties, with comments including "cracking figures" and "very buoyant" and "exceedingly good" for figures in 2009.

At the end of the hearing Judge Coles said that the tribunal had reached its decision unanimously. It was critical that the original creation of the vegetable plots was an open ended rather than a fixed term, a "hopeful undertaking."

Mr Cumming's emails and telephone conversations around the beginning of September showed that there was at least some element of discrimination in the decision to close the demonstration beds.

He had told the tribunal in evidence that when he had told the board about the engagement of Mr Hashman as a 'grow your own' gardener there had been some "grunts" which the panel saw as some degree of dissatisfaction.

In an email, which mentioned "old stuff that people can't move on from," Mr Cumming accepted he had referred to the Clarkes and Mr Hashman.

Mr Hashman's reply email, which talked about "hunting issues" had not been challenged by Mr Cumming.

Only one of the five witnesses for Orchard Park, Mr Cumming, had attended the hearing, and only one of the four absentees had offered any sort of reason for their non-attendance.

"We felt that Richard Cumming was in a very difficult, and unenviable, situation, having to defend the positions of the other board members," said the judge.

"Mr Hashman says he (RC) is a decent, honest man, and there was never any question of his acting in a discriminatory way."

"It is clear to us that the time came when Mr and Mrs Clarke could not tolerate the constant presence of Mr Hashman working at Orchard Park, and that was discriminatory because of his opinions on fox hunting."

At the end of the final part of the hearing, Mr Hare asked for the judgement in writing, for Mr Hashman.

"He feels that this has happened before and he wants to place on record for all to see that he will stand up and fight in law anyone who discriminates against him," said the barrister.