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United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal |
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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> United Kingdom Employment Appeal Tribunal >> Williams v. Owens Corning Fibreglass (Gb) Ltd [2001] UKEAT 1039_00_1312 (13 December 2001) URL: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/2001/1039_00_1312.html Cite as: [2001] UKEAT 1039__1312, [2001] UKEAT 1039_00_1312 |
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At the Tribunal | |
Before
HIS HONOUR JUDGE D PUGSLEY
MR B GIBBS
MRS R A VICKERS
APPELLANT | |
RESPONDENT |
Transcript of Proceedings
JUDGMENT
Revised
For the Appellant | MR T WILLIAMS (Solicitor) Messrs Tudor Williams & Co Solicitors 27 Chester Street Wrexham Clwyd LL13 8BG |
For the Respondent | MR N GRUNDY (Of Counsel) Messrs Eversheds Solicitors London Scottish House 24 Mount Street Manchester M2 3DB |
JUDGE D PUGSLEY
"The scoring system employed by the Respondent was an arrangement which placed the disabled Applicant at a substantial disadvantage in comparison with people who were not disabled. The Respondent therefore came under the duty to take such steps as were reasonable for it to take in order to prevent the arrangement from having that effect. There was no evidence of any compelling reason, or any reason at all, why the scoring system had to be arranged as it was. [It was noted that in the resin plant a slightly modified system was applied]. There was no suggestion of any reason other than the Applicant's disability which prevented him from acquiring a second skill, and the four points would have gone with it. There was no evidence that the Respondent gave any consideration to modifying its scoring system at all so as to prevent the Applicant from suffering the substantial disadvantage of the loss of four marks. Further, there was no evidence that the Respondent's failure to consider making any adjustments, or its failure to make any adjustments was justified."
On this basis the Tribunal were unanimous that the Applicant was discriminated against under Section 5(2) of the Act. There is no appeal from that decision.
"So far as the dismissal itself is concerned both members were of the view that the Applicant's claim under Section 5(1) should fail because his dismissal, which was the action of less favourable treatment complained of, arose because he decided to volunteer for redundancy and therefore was not treatment of him by the Respondent. The Chairman takes a different view, namely that the dismissal of the Applicant by reason of redundancy did amount to less favourable treatment for a reason which was related to his disability, because the reason the Applicant volunteered was, to a significant degree, because he was placed in the high risk category and, further, the reason that he was placed in the high risk category was because of the scoring system adopted by the Respondent which placed him at a substantial disadvantage and which the Tribunal unanimously found to have been discriminatory."
"Whatever the respective actions of the employers and the time when the contract of employment was terminated, at the end of the day the question always remains the same. Who really terminated the contract of employment?"
" . . .because he [the Applicant] had been in charge of a team for a number of years it was difficult for them to see how a score of zero for teamwork could be justified.
He cites N.C Watling v Richardson ]1978] ICR 1049. He criticises the use of the word satisfy and takes us back to the well known case of Boys and Girls Welfare Society v Macdonald [1997] ICR 693.
"It is difficult to see how a dismissal which resulted from the scoring system which was found to be discriminatory could be held to be a fair dismissal."