A part-time university cleaner has been awarded £264,442 in compensation for unfair dismissal and victimisation, following a tribunal ruling that she was sacked after a dispute over a student's rice cooker.

Peak Ong, then 69, successfully brought her case against Aberystwyth University, where she had worked 15 hours a week as a cleaner since 2014.

The employment tribunal heard that her dismissal stemmed from long-standing animosity with her manager, Catherine Green, which intensified after Ms Ong was accused of buying a rice cooker for a student whose appliance had been confiscated due to a university ban.

The Welsh university had argued Ms Ong was dismissed for failing to improve her behaviour after mediation.

However, the Birmingham tribunal identified significant flaws in her disciplinary process.…