A civil servant claims she felt forced to resign after being threatened with dismissal for sharing Facebook posts from the Reform Party and Nigel Farage.

Michelle Cochrane, 45, worked as an administration officer for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) since July 2021 and described her role as one she loved.

Michelle, from Blyth, Northumberland, held views critical of government policies on immigration and public spending. During the general election period, she shared 14 posts between June and July, including critiques of Labour, immigration policies, early prisoner releases, and public finance management. Among these, 11 were from the Reform Party, one from UKIP, one from Nigel Farage, and one was a Daily Express article. A couple of the posts included her own comments.

Although Michelle’s Facebook profile made no reference to her job or employer, she was summoned in August to a disciplinary meeting. She was warned that an investigation into her posts would take place and was told that, if found guilty of gross misconduct, she would likely face dismissal. Michelle defended her actions, citing her right to free speech and pointing out that colleagues had shared posts from other political parties without facing any repercussions.

Feeling "railroaded" and believing dismissal was inevitable, Michelle decided to resign to protect her mental health. She described the experience as “traumatic,” stating, “I felt I had no choice but to resign. I deleted my whole Facebook account as soon as I realised it was an issue.”

She added: “The majority of what I was posting was just reposts from the Reform Party’s Facebook – I wrote a couple of things myself but nothing extreme. I feel like if I reposted things from the Labour Party, I would have been ok. Colleagues have done that before, and no action was taken.”

Michelle also criticized the tone of the disciplinary meeting. "The meeting was supposed to be a 'fact-finding' meeting, but it sounded like it was already disciplinary," she said.