After a four day hearing at London's Central Tribunal Courts, Birmingham Perry Barr MP Khalid Mahmood was ruled to have unfairly dismissed his parliamentary aide Elaina Cohen, with whom he had an affair for two years.

Mr Mahmood was elected in 2001 and was the first Muslim MP in Britain. He has held the same seat ever since then.

Ms Cohen worked for Mr Mahmood from 2003 to 2021 and the case was brought by her, as she claimed she had been unfairly dismissed after blowing the whistle on a colleague.

During the hearing, the Tribunal heard details of the working relationship between the Labour MP and Ms Cohen - who was his senior advisor - in the years after their affair.

Ms Cohen claimed she was discriminated against and harassed because of her race, religion or belief, but this was dismissed by the Tribunal panel.

In August of 2019, Ms Cohen received an “abusive email” after raising concerns about behaviour that she felt breached parliamentary standards. This led to her making a formal complaint in October 2019.

In December 2019, Mr Mahmood was re-elected at the general election. By January 2020 Ms Cohen had not had any contact from him, so sent him a WhatsApp message.

Later that month an anonymous informant made serious allegations against Mr Mahmood, with further informants coming forward at a later date.

Ms Cohen contacted the police and informed Mahmood but a police investigation in March 2020 concluded there was no case to answer.

In April 2020 Ms Cohen again complained about the lack of contact from Mr Mahmood  and in July 2020 she complained that staff had made anti-semitic remarks.

In November 2020 Ms Cohen was given a formal warning and in 2021 was subject to disciplinary proceedings.  She was dismissed by email later that month.

The Tribunal found that although three of the five allegations listed by Mr Mahmood were “ample reasonable grounds for belief in misconduct”, the way Ms Cohen’s dismissal had been carried out was “outside of the range of reasonable responses” and she had therefore been unfairly dismissed.

However, the Tribunal did find that Ms Cohen had not established that the decision to dismiss her was related to her race, religion or belief.