Victimisation: Liability of the Provider and Recipient of a Discriminatory Reference

People often assert that they have been the victim of "victimisation" without understanding what it is. In essence, victimisation is a particular form of discrimination that involves treating a person less favourably because he or she has complained (or intend to complain) about discrimination, or because they have given evidence in relation to another person's complaint.

The Employment Appeal Tribunal has now handed down an interesting decision addressing this area of law. In the case, Bullimore v Pothecary Witham Weld Solicitors, Ms Bullimore was a solicitor who lost an offer of employment because her former employer provided a poor reference. The reference specifically cited the fact that she had previously pursued a claim of sex discrimination against it and went on to refer to her "poor relationship" with the firm's partners and to her "inflexible" opinions. The employment tribunal, quite correctly, found that Ms Bullimore had been the victim of unlawful victimisation by both her former employer and her prospective employer.

The employment tribunal then went on hold that Ms Bullimore's claim for loss of future earnings against the reference provider was too remote. The EAT disagreed with this reasoning, observing that if this were the case and the prospective employer had withdrawn its offer of employment for a non-discriminatory reason, Ms Bullimore would have been left with no remedy for her loss of earnings. The EAT remitted the case back to the employment tribunal, the Respondents having already agreed that they would apportion damages between them to reflect their respective culpability and their degree of responsibility for the loss that Ms Bullimore had suffered.

Bonfire of the Quangos: Equality and Human Rights Commission to go?

The Daily Telegraph has published a leaked list of 177 quangos due to be abolished, which include a number of employment and training related quangos such as the the Union Modernisation Advisory Fund. A further 94 quangos remain "under review" and may be scrapped in the future. Perhaps the most notable of which, from an employment perspective, is the Equality and Human Rights Commission. 350 bodies escape the axe, including Acas and the UK Commission for Employment and Skills.

You can see the full list here.

New guide to managing work-related stress published

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, in conjunction with the HSE and Acas, has published a new guide to managing stress at work. Entitled "Work-related stress: what the law says", it explores the potential legal consequences of ignoring these responsibilities, and gives advice on tackling stress through good management.

The guide is available to download here.

Survey shows coalition split on workers' rights

The British Chambers of Commerce has published results from a survey of MPs that suggest some divisions within the Coalition on top business concerns. The ComRes-conducted survey found clear discrepancies among MPs from the two Coalition parties, perhaps the most remarkable of which being on the issue of whether the balance of employment law has shifted too far towards the employee, to the detriment of the employer. 87% of Conservative MPs surveyed agreed that it had; 71% of Liberal Democrats polled disagreed. This is a notable difference of opinion on an issue that the BCC claims is preventing businesses from taking on more staff.

You can read the BCC's Press Release here.

Twitter

Well, we've finally taken the Twitter penny. You can find us on there by looking for "SynergyEmpLaw", or by clicking here. We'll be tweeting regularly to pass on anything in the employment law and HR arenas that happen to catch our eye. Log on and join the conversation!

Handing in your notice? This is the week you're most likely to do it...

This caught our eye: a staggering 37% of people handing in their notice this year will do so this week - the third week in September. And 24% of people do it in the first week of February. Actually, this is perhaps less surprising than it sounds - each of these weeks fall four weeks after the end of the traditional holiday seasons. And as the research comes on the back of EU figures showing British employees work harder than most of Europe (only Romanians and Bulgarians put in longer hours) it all starts to make perfect sense.

You can find the rest of the story here.

Pope to criticise equality laws

It has been reported that, in a speech on Friday, the Pope will criticise Britain's equality laws, and that they shouldn't overshadow Christians' rights to express their religion.

It's probably worth reminding ourselves of the area of law this largely stems from. First up - indirect discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief. In an employment context, this means that an employer must not have selection criteria, policies, employment rules or any other practices that apply to everyone regardless of religion, but have the effect of disadvantaging employees or job applicants of a particular religion or belief, unless the employer can show that they are justified. Attempts by Christians to rely on this legislation have led to a number of high profile media stories (perhaps most famously Eweida v British Airways, in which an air stewardess claimed, unsuccessfully, that BA's dress code, which forbade the wearing of a visible cross, was indirectly discriminatory). Secondly, Under the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007 no-one should be refused goods or services on the grounds of their sexuality; this sparked outrage in April this year when the then shadow Home Secretary, Chris Grayling, defended two Christian B&B owners who refused a room to a couple on the basis that they were gay.

In short, expect a heated media debate over the next few days...

Read more here.

Annual Tribunal Statistics Published

The annual statistics for the Employment Tribunal and EAT for the twelve months to 31 March 2010 have been published - and, as ever, they make for interesting reading. We've had a look at them so you don't have to, and the main points to note are:

• Employment Tribunal claims rose year on year by 56%. This has been linked to a rise in multiple claims (up by nearly 90%) and the changing economic climate.
• Because of "multiple airline industry cases that are re-submitted every three months", the greatest increases came in working time claims (297%) and claims for unauthorised deductions (122%).
• Claims for breach of contract increased by 29%, for age discrimination by 36% and claims for redundancy payments increased by a whopping 76%.
• 71% of equal pay claims and 57% of sex discrimination claims do not make it to a tribunal hearing, making them the claims most likely to be withdrawn.
• The claim most likely to be settled via ACAS conciliation is disability discrimination (45%).
• The claim that is most likely to be successful at tribunal is a claim for redundancy pay (24% of which were successful).

A question we're always asked by parties to a tribunal claim is "how much am I/they going to get?". There's inevitably a how-long-is-a-piece-of-string element to any answer you can give, but we can say what the mean/median and maximum amount of any award was for any particular claim. And they are:

• Unfair dismissal: £9,120 (mean), £4,903 (median), £234,549 (maximum);
• Race discrimination: £18,584, £5,392, £374,922;
• Sex discrimination: £19,499, £6,275, £442,366;
• Disability discrimination: £52,087, £8,553, £729,347;
• Religious discrimination: £4,886, £5,000, £9,500;
• Sexual orientation discrimination: £20,384, £5,000, £163,725;
• Age discrimination: £10,931, £5,868, £48,710.

If you want to see all of the statistics in detail, the report is available to download here.