49 judgments interpreting, applying, or limiting the provisions of this Act. Sorted by court tier then reverse-chronologically.
Employers cannot sack staff and rehire them on worse terms purely to strip away a benefit they were promised was permanent. Even outside equal-pay law, this fire-and-rehire tactic can be blocked by ordinary contract principles protecting the original bargain.
A contractual right to permanent retained pay, agreed in 2007 in lieu of relocation packages, was to be construed as incorporating an implied term that the employer would not exercise its ordinary termination-and-re-engagement rights for the sole purpose of removing that retained pay; while the case turned on ordinary contract principles rather than s.66 EA 2010, the Court emphasised the importance of giving effect to the bargain that the parties actually struck.
Holding. An implied contractual term precludes an employer from dismissing-and-re-engaging solely to remove a contractually permanent benefit; the principle was applied here without recourse to s.66 EA 2010.
Mostly female shop staff can compare their pay against mostly male warehouse workers in different sites, opening the door to a major equal-pay claim. Employers cannot avoid equal-pay scrutiny just by splitting men and women across different premises.
For the purposes of the sex equality clause in s.66 (with cross-establishment comparison under s.79(4) EA 2010), the 'common terms' test requires a broad, purposive comparison and may be satisfied by the 'North hypothetical': would distribution employees, if relocated to the retail stores, have been employed on broadly the same terms? On the facts, predominantly female shop-floor workers could compare themselves with predominantly male distribution-depot workers.
Holding. Under s.79(4) EA 2010, cross-establishment comparison is permissible where, applying a broad-brush 'North hypothetical' test, common terms would have applied between the two establishments — not a line-by-line comparison.
If you bring a discrimination claim, you must first show enough facts pointing to a discriminatory reason. Statistics about who gets hired alone are not enough. Once you clear that bar, the employer must then prove their decision had nothing to do with it.
On a complaint of direct race discrimination under s.13 EA 2010, the claimant retains the burden at the first stage of proving on the balance of probabilities the primary facts from which an inference of discrimination could be drawn; statistical disparity in recruitment outcomes is not enough without primary facts pointing to a discriminatory reason 'because of' a protected characteristic.
Holding. Section 136 EA 2010 did not alter the substantive position: the claimant must prove primary facts on the balance of probabilities from which discrimination could be inferred before the burden shifts to the respondent.
Charities are allowed to focus their help on a particular community, like an Orthodox Jewish housing charity letting flats only to its own community, where doing so meets a real and acute group need and the wider exclusion is proportionate.
A charitable housing association allocating its (limited) stock exclusively to members of the Orthodox Jewish community fell squarely within the charities exception in s.193 EA 2010: the allocation policy pursued a legitimate aim of meeting acute communal need on a group basis (as Parliament contemplated) and was a proportionate means of doing so, and so did not breach s.29 or the s.149 PSED.
Holding. Section 193 EA 2010 permits charities to focus their benefits on a defined protected-characteristic group; proportionality is assessed on a group basis comparing the disadvantages of those outside the group with the advantages to those inside.
Courts give the Government wide leeway on benefits policy. Even where a cap hits lone parents with very young children hardest, judges will not strike it down if ministers thought it through, weighed the trade-offs, and provided discretionary top-up funds for the worst cases.
The revised benefit cap was not manifestly without reasonable foundation in its differential impact on lone parents with very young children: the Secretary of State's policy judgment — that long-term outcomes for children improve where an adult works and that Discretionary Housing Payments provide an adequate safety valve — passed the high threshold for review of socio-economic legislation, and the s.149 PSED was satisfied.
Holding. Where a socio-economic measure is challenged for breach of the PSED or Article 14 ECHR, the 'manifestly without reasonable foundation' test applies and the Government's reasoned policy judgment, supported by DHPs, is not displaced.
Discrimination can be unlawful where you are treated worse because of someone you are connected to. But that link must be real and direct. Refusing to print a slogan about gay marriage is about the slogan, not about gay people themselves.
Although direct discrimination under s.13 EA 2010 (and parallels) extends to associative discrimination, the requisite association between the protected characteristic and the impugned treatment must be sufficiently close; refusing to ice a cake with the message 'Support Gay Marriage' was not associative sexual-orientation discrimination because the objection was to the message itself, not to gay people or those associated with them.
Holding. Associative direct discrimination requires a sufficiently close connection between the protected characteristic of the person associated and the impugned treatment; objection to a message is not enough.
Gig and contract workers who must turn up themselves, wear the firm's uniform and follow its rules are 'employees' for equality law, even if their paperwork says self-employed. Branded vans and tracked tools tell the real story.
A plumber operating under a contract that required personal performance, conferred only a limited (informal) right of substitution and bound him to wear branded uniform, drive a branded tracked van and follow control-room instructions, was an 'employee' within the extended definition in s.83(2)(a) EA 2010 (and a worker for ERA / WTR purposes), because personal performance was the dominant feature of the contract and Pimlico was not a client or customer of his business.
Holding. The s.83(2)(a) EA 2010 'extended employment' definition catches a contract under which personal performance is the dominant feature and the putative employer is not in reality a client of the worker's business.
If you only qualify for a particular benefit, like an ill-health pension, because of your disability, getting it on slightly less generous terms is not unlawful. The law protects against being treated worse, not against benefits being calculated differently than a non-disabled colleague's.
'Unfavourable treatment' under s.15(1) EA 2010 sets a relatively low but real threshold of disadvantage; awarding an enhanced ill-health pension calculated on the claimant's reduced part-time salary, which he worked only because of his disability, was not unfavourable — he could not have received any immediate pension at all but for his disability, so the treatment was at worst neutral.
Holding. A pension or benefit that the claimant only became entitled to because of his disability cannot be 'unfavourable treatment' under s.15(1) EA 2010, even if a non-disabled comparator might have received more.
Where the state provides single-sex services, like hostels for ex-prisoners, it cannot leave women with far fewer or far worse-located options than men. Even with a separate-services exception, the government must show the arrangements are a proportionate way of meeting need.
Although pleaded as indirect discrimination under s.19 EA 2010, the Court characterised the much smaller number and uneven geographical spread of Approved Premises for women released on licence as direct sex discrimination under s.13 (women being routinely placed far from home in a way men were not); the Sch 3 para 26 separate-services exception applied in principle but the Secretary of State had not shown the limited provision was a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.
Holding. Disparate provision of single-sex Approved Premises is direct sex discrimination (not indirect under s.19) and the s.158/Sch 3 para 26 exception cannot be relied upon without proof of proportionality.
If a workplace rule ends up hurting one group much more than others, women, disabled people, an ethnic group, you do not have to prove why. Just show the rule disadvantages your group and harmed you. The employer must then justify it.
Indirect discrimination under s.19 EA 2010 does not require the claimant to identify or prove the reason why a PCP places the protected group at a particular disadvantage; the essential elements are a causal link between the PCP and the group disadvantage and a causal link between the PCP and the claimant's individual disadvantage — statistical evidence of disparate impact, coupled with the claimant's failure under the PCP, will normally suffice subject to justification.
Holding. Indirect discrimination under s.19 EA 2010 does not require proof of the reason for the PCP's group disparate impact; a causal link between the PCP, the group's disadvantage and the individual's disadvantage is enough (subject to justification).
Bus companies cannot just have a polite 'please move' policy for wheelchair spaces. Drivers must do more, like firmly require an obstructing passenger to move, or even refuse to drive on for a short time, so wheelchair users can actually travel.
The s.20 EA 2010 reasonable-adjustments duty (read with Sch 2) is anticipatory in respect of services and requires more than a polite request: a bus operator must instruct its drivers, where a non-wheelchair user unreasonably refuses to vacate the wheelchair space, to consider further steps (e.g. rephrasing the request as a requirement and refusing to drive on for a few minutes) — a 'first come, first served' policy is not enough.
Holding. Section 20 EA 2010 (Sch 2) requires service-providers to take positive anticipatory steps, including pressure on obstructing passengers, to enable disabled passengers to use accessible space — not merely to ask.
If a landlord is trying to evict you and your disability is part of the reason for the rent arrears or behaviour complained of, the court must hold a proper hearing. It cannot wave the case through; it has to weigh up whether eviction is really proportionate.
On a possession claim defended on the basis of s.15 EA 2010 (then s.35), a court must conduct a structured proportionality assessment under s.15(1)(b) rather than the Article 8 'short shrift' approach of Pinnock and Powell; the substantive equality right is different in kind from the Article 8 right and ordinarily resolution requires a trial of disputed facts rather than summary disposal.
Holding. A disability-discrimination defence to a possession claim engages an EA 2010 s.15 structured proportionality analysis that cannot be summarily disposed of on Article 8 grounds.
If you are disabled and apply as homeless, the council must actually look at your particular condition and what homelessness would do to you, not just tick a generic vulnerability box. Officers should investigate enough to make a real, individual judgment.
The s.149 EA 2010 PSED applies to homelessness decision-making under Part VII of the Housing Act 1996; in deciding whether an applicant is in 'priority need' as a vulnerable disabled person, the reviewing officer must focus sharply on the disabled applicant's particular characteristics and needs and make such reasonable inquiries as are needed, asking whether the applicant is significantly more vulnerable than an ordinary person if made homeless.
Holding. Section 149 EA 2010 applies to s.189 Housing Act 1996 priority-need decisions; reviewing officers must give 'sharp focus' to the individual disabled applicant's vulnerabilities.
A B&B that refuses a double room to a same-sex couple is breaking the law, even if the owners' religious beliefs are sincere. Running a business open to the public means serving gay customers on the same terms as everyone else.
Hoteliers' refusal of a double-bedded room to a same-sex civil-partnered couple was direct sexual-orientation discrimination under the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007 (the analogue of s.13 EA 2010), because civil partnership is in law equivalent to marriage and the differential treatment was on grounds of sexual orientation; the hoteliers' Article 9 manifestation rights did not justify the discrimination.
Holding. Refusing services to a civil-partnered couple on grounds of the proprietors' religious objection to same-sex relationships is direct sexual-orientation discrimination under regulations equivalent to s.13 EA 2010 and is not capable of justification by Article 9.
Equality protections reach beyond standard employees. Even people in unusual roles, like fee-paid part-time judges, can count as workers under the Act if their working conditions look broadly like those of regular employees. Job titles do not control coverage.
Following the CJEU's preliminary ruling, fee-paid part-time recorders were 'workers' for the purposes of the Part-Time Workers Directive and the 2000 Regulations: judicial office-holders are within the protective scope of EU employment law where they work under conditions substantively comparable to those of a full-time employee — illustrating the breadth of 'employment' under s.83(2)(a) EA 2010.
Holding. Fee-paid part-time judicial office-holders are 'workers' within the Part-Time Workers Directive (and so within the extended s.83 EA 2010 definition of employment) where their conditions are substantively comparable to employees'.
Burden-of-proof rules only matter when a tribunal genuinely cannot tell what happened. If it can work out the real reason for the employer's decision from the evidence, it does not need to go through any technical shifting-burden ritual.
The Igen/Madarassy two-stage burden-of-proof framework (now codified in s.136 EA 2010) is not to be applied mechanically: it has nothing to offer where the tribunal is in a position to make positive findings of fact one way or the other; the burden of proof matters only where the tribunal is in genuine doubt on the primary facts.
Holding. Section 136 EA 2010 has no bearing where the tribunal is able to make positive findings of fact; the two-stage burden of proof is a tool for cases of genuine evidential doubt, not a 'barren ritual'.
A rule that requires a qualification you cannot realistically gain before retirement age can be age discrimination against older staff, even if it looks neutral on paper. Employers must justify any requirement that effectively shuts older workers out of promotion.
Particular disadvantage under s.19 EA 2010 in an age case is assessed by reference to the claimant's age group: a requirement of a law degree for promotion to the top pay grade was indirectly age-discriminatory against older employees who could not obtain a law degree before reaching mandatory retirement age, even where the PCP itself was age-neutral on its face.
Holding. A PCP that disadvantages employees of a particular age group because they cannot meet it before reaching retirement age is indirectly discriminatory under s.19 EA 2010, regardless of any individual choice to retire earlier.
If your medication or coping strategies hide how much an impairment affects you, the tribunal asks what could well happen without them, not what is more likely than not. This sets a low bar for being counted as disabled at work.
The word "likely" in the deduced-effects provision (now Sch 1 para 5 EA 2010) means "could well happen" rather than "more probable than not"; tribunals assessing whether an impairment would substantially affect day-to-day activities but for medication or coping strategies should apply that lower threshold.
Holding. "Likely" in the disability provisions of the DDA 1995 (now Sch 1 EA 2010) connotes a real possibility — "could well happen" — not a balance-of-probabilities test.
What matters is what an employer or school actually did, not why they thought they were doing it. Even well-meaning rules that turn on race, sex or another protected characteristic count as direct discrimination, however benign the motive seemed.
Direct discrimination under what is now s.13 EA 2010 turns on the factual criterion applied by the discriminator, not on his subjective motive or benign religious purpose; a Jewish school's admissions test based on matrilineal descent was direct race discrimination because matrilineal descent is, by definition, a test of ethnic origin.
Holding. Direct discrimination is determined by the factual criterion applied, not the discriminator's motive; a matrilineal-descent admissions test is direct race discrimination on grounds of ethnic origin.
Employers must take reasonable steps to remove barriers a disabled employee faces, and this can include genuine preferential treatment, such as redeploying them to a suitable vacancy without making them compete for it against other staff.
The reasonable-adjustments duty (now in s.20 EA 2010) necessarily entails an element of more favourable treatment of disabled employees, including transfer to a more senior post without competitive interview where doing so would remove the substantial disadvantage; the 'no more favourable treatment' principle in s.6(7) DDA 1995 was subordinate to the adjustments duty itself.
Holding. Sections 20–21 EA 2010 may require an employer to treat a disabled employee more favourably than non-disabled colleagues, including transfer without competitive interview, where that is a reasonable step to remove a substantial disadvantage.
An employer who declines to give a reference while a discrimination claim is live is not automatically punishing you for bringing the claim. If the real reason is preserving their legal position honestly and reasonably, that is not victimisation.
Victimisation (now s.27 EA 2010) requires the protected act to be a real reason — conscious or unconscious — for the impugned treatment: an employer who honestly and reasonably declines to provide a reference solely in order to preserve its position in pending discrimination proceedings is not acting 'by reason that' the employee did the protected act, but because of the existence of the proceedings themselves.
Holding. An employer may, without committing victimisation contrary to what is now s.27 EA 2010, take honest and reasonable steps to preserve its position in pending discrimination proceedings — the protected act will not be the operative reason for the treatment.
Sacking a woman because she is pregnant and will need time off is unlawful, full stop. You do not have to point to a man who was treated better; pregnancy is unique to women, and dismissing for it is automatically sex discrimination.
Applying the CJEU's preliminary ruling, dismissal of a pregnant woman engaged on an indefinite contract because she would be temporarily unavailable due to her pregnancy is sex discrimination contrary to the Equal Treatment Directive (now reflected in pregnancy/maternity discrimination under s.18 EA 2010); no male comparator is required because pregnancy is a uniquely female condition.
Holding. Dismissing a woman on an indefinite contract because pregnancy will make her temporarily unavailable is unlawful sex discrimination without need for a male comparator.
If a service uses a rule that is inherently tied to sex, such as different pension ages for men and women, that is direct sex discrimination regardless of how kindly meant. The test looks at the rule itself, not the intention behind it.
Established that direct discrimination (now s.13 EA 2010) is judged objectively by reference to a gender-based (or other characteristic-based) criterion: a swimming-pool concession tied to state-pension age was direct sex discrimination because pensionable age was itself sex-based (60 for women, 65 for men), regardless of the council's benign social-policy motive.
Holding. A criterion that is inherently sex-based (e.g. state-pension age) constitutes direct sex discrimination irrespective of the discriminator's motive; the test is objective and criterion-based, not subjective.
Equal pay is checked one term at a time. An employer cannot underpay a woman on basic salary and then point to other perks she gets to even things out. Each part of the package must match a male comparator's separately.
Equal pay under the Equal Pay Act 1970 (now operating through the sex equality clause in s.66 read with the comparator framework in s.79 EA 2010) requires equality term by term, not on an overall package basis; the female canteen cook was entitled to the same basic pay as her male comparators on like work, notwithstanding the package of other benefits she enjoyed.
Holding. The equality term in the Equal Pay Act 1970 (now the sex equality clause in s.66 EA 2010) operates term by term, not on an overall comparison of contractual packages.
Sacking someone simply for expressing a protected belief, such as opposing gender-fluidity teaching in primary schools, is unlawful discrimination. The employer must show its reaction was a proportionate response to genuinely objectionable conduct, not just the belief itself.
Beliefs that the claimant manifested on Facebook — opposition to gender-fluidity teaching and to same-sex relationship education in primary schools — were a protected manifestation of her Christian / gender-critical belief under s.10 EA 2010; the Court of Appeal confirmed that adverse treatment for such manifestation is automatically direct discrimination under s.13 read with s.10 unless the employer establishes objective justification under Articles 9 and 10 ECHR.
Holding. Dismissal for the mere manifestation of a protected belief is direct discrimination under s.13 read with s.10 EA 2010 unless the employer's response is objectively justified as a proportionate interference with Articles 9 and 10 ECHR.
You cannot be sacked simply for holding a religious view. But if you repeatedly break clear, reasonable rules about how and when to express it, like ignoring instructions on media interviews, dismissal can still be lawful if proportionate.
Removal of a non-executive director who repeatedly gave unauthorised media interviews stating his religious belief that same-sex adoption was wrong was not religion-or-belief discrimination or victimisation under ss.13/27 EA 2010: the dismissal was because of his persistent, separable misconduct in failing to comply with reasonable instructions about media communications, not because of his belief or his protected acts; the interference with Article 9/10 rights was proportionate.
Holding. Adverse treatment for separable misconduct (here, breach of media-communication instructions) connected with, but distinct from, the manifestation of a protected belief is lawful under ss.13/27 EA 2010 if the response is proportionate under Articles 9/10 ECHR.
Religious organisations have a narrow exception that lets them require clergy to follow doctrine on marriage. A bishop can lawfully refuse a licence to a priest in a same-sex marriage. This exception does not apply to ordinary employers or services.
A bishop's refusal to grant an Extra-Parochial Ministry Licence to a clergyman who had entered a same-sex marriage fell within the genuine occupational requirement / organised-religion exception (Sch 9 para 2 EA 2010): conformity to the Church of England's doctrine of marriage was a requirement applied to comply with that doctrine, and so the s.12/s.13 sexual-orientation discrimination claim could not succeed.
Holding. The Sch 9 para 2 organised-religion exception applies to a bishop's decision on a clergy licence; conformity with C of E doctrine on marriage is a permitted occupational requirement and defeats a s.12/s.13 sexual-orientation discrimination claim.
Being labelled an officer or constable does not strip you of ordinary employment rights, including the right to be consulted through a union about redundancies. Equality-related exceptions for special job categories must be read narrowly.
Although decided on ECHR Articles 8/11 read with TULRCA 1992 s.280 (rather than under Sch 9 EA 2010), Vining bears on the employment-status questions that underpin Sch 9 occupational requirements: parks-police constables were ordinary employees for the purposes of redundancy collective-consultation rights, and the blanket statutory exclusion of trade-union consultation rights in relation to them was an unjustified interference with their Article 11 right to associate via UNISON.
Holding. Statutory exclusion of parks-police officers from TULRCA collective-consultation rights breaches their Article 11 ECHR rights; the case underscores that 'office of constable' status does not automatically displace ordinary employment-law protections.
Employers can be required to tweak sickness-absence trigger points for disabled staff, like discounting disability-related days off. But only where the change would actually help. If your absence pattern means the adjustment would not really make a difference, it is not reasonable.
An attendance-management policy with absence trigger points may put disabled employees at a substantial disadvantage under s.20 EA 2010, but proposed adjustments (such as extending those triggers or discounting disability-related absence) are only reasonable steps where they would have a real prospect of alleviating that disadvantage; on the facts, neither adjustment proposed was reasonable in light of the claimant's pattern of recurring disability absence.
Holding. Section 20 EA 2010 may require adjustment of absence trigger points for disabled employees, but only where the adjustment would have a real prospect of removing the substantial disadvantage.
Reasonable adjustments are for the disabled employee themselves. If you are a non-disabled worker caring for a disabled relative, your employer does not have to adjust your role to suit their needs, though other family-friendly rights may still apply.
The reasonable-adjustments duty under s.20 EA 2010 (and Article 5 of Directive 2000/78) is owed only to a disabled employee, applicant or other person to whom the relevant Part applies; it does not extend to making adjustments for the disabled relative of a non-disabled employee, even by analogy with the associative discrimination recognised in Coleman.
Holding. Section 20 EA 2010 and Article 5 of Directive 2000/78 do not impose an adjustments duty for the benefit of a non-disabled employee's disabled family member.
The bedroom tax disadvantages disabled tenants who need extra space, but the courts let it stand because ministers knowingly considered the impact and put discretionary housing payments in place as a safety net. The disadvantage was held to be justified.
The Secretary of State satisfied the s.149 EA 2010 PSED when introducing the social-sector size criteria ('bedroom tax'): he was conscious of and properly took into account the policy's adverse impact on disabled tenants, and the discriminatory effect was justified by the legitimate aims of controlling housing-benefit expenditure and incentivising mobility, supported by the safety valve of DHPs.
Holding. The PSED under s.149 EA 2010 was satisfied for the 'bedroom tax' regulations; their discriminatory effect on disabled tenants was justified within the wide margin of appreciation for socio-economic measures.
If an employer mistreats a migrant worker because their visa makes them vulnerable, that is not race discrimination under this Act, even if it feels deeply unfair. Immigration status is treated as a separate issue, addressed through other laws like modern slavery protections.
Migrant domestic workers mistreated by their employers because they were vulnerable on account of their tied-visa immigration status were not subjected to direct race or nationality discrimination under s.39 read with s.13 EA 2010: immigration status is not 'indissociably linked' with nationality, so mistreatment exploiting a particular immigration status is a distinct ground and outside the scope of the protected characteristic.
Holding. Immigration status is a distinct ground from nationality for s.13/s.39 EA 2010 purposes; exploitation of a worker's vulnerability arising from their immigration status is not direct race or nationality discrimination.
Before a minister or council takes a decision that may hit disabled people or other protected groups, they must genuinely think about the impact, on paper, with proper evidence, before signing off. A rubber-stamp equality assessment afterwards will not do.
Reaffirmed and synthesised the leading PSED principles under s.149 EA 2010: the duty rests personally on the Minister, must be discharged in substance, with rigour and with an open mind before (not after) the decision is taken, and must be evidenced by a 'structured attempt to focus upon the details of equality issues'; closure of the Independent Living Fund was unlawful because the Minister had not been given sufficient information to discharge the duty.
Holding. Section 149 EA 2010 demands a personal, conscious, rigorous and substantive consideration of equality impacts before a policy decision is taken; the duty is not a tick-box exercise and must be evidenced.
A workplace rule requiring Sunday working can disadvantage Christian staff and may amount to indirect discrimination. But employers running services that need round-the-clock cover, like children's homes, can often justify it if the staffing need is genuine.
A Sunday-working requirement at a children's home was a PCP capable of putting Christian employees at a particular disadvantage under s.19 EA 2010 even where their objection to Sunday working was not shared by all Christians; on the facts, however, the ET was entitled to find the PCP a proportionate means of achieving the legitimate aim of properly staffing the residential home around the clock, and the tribunal did not err in considering that the belief was not a core tenet shared by most Christians (although that factor should have weighed in the employee's favour where Article 9 was engaged).
Holding. Sunday-working PCPs can engage s.19 indirect religious discrimination, but justification is fact-sensitive and a proportionate staffing need defeats the claim.
If you show enough facts that look like discrimination, ignoring any defence for a moment, the burden flips. Your employer must then prove the decision had absolutely nothing to do with race, sex or any protected characteristic. Otherwise you win.
Reformulated the Barton guidance on the two-stage burden-of-proof analysis (now in s.136 EA 2010): at the first stage the tribunal must consider what facts could be proved by the claimant from which, in the absence of an adequate explanation, it could conclude discrimination — assuming for that purpose that there is no adequate explanation; if such facts are made out, the burden shifts to the respondent under the second stage to show 'no discrimination whatsoever'.
Holding. The two-stage burden-of-proof analysis under s.63A SDA 1975 (now s.136 EA 2010) requires the tribunal to assume at stage one that there is no adequate explanation for the primary facts; if discrimination 'could' be inferred, the burden shifts and the respondent must show 'no discrimination whatsoever'.
If a third party complains about you to your employer and the employer then discriminates, you usually cannot sue the complainer directly. The employer made the decision. Only where the third party effectively forced the discriminatory outcome can they be on the hook.
Although the ET had upheld harassment and direct-discrimination claims under s.26 and s.13 EA 2010 against the claimant's chambers in respect of her gender-critical belief, the EAT dismissed her separate appeal against Stonewall (a third-party complainant) under s.111 EA 2010: a third party who induces or causes a basic contravention is liable only where, on a fair statutory construction, its conduct can properly be said to have caused the principal's act, and the ET was entitled to find that Stonewall's complaint did not cause the chambers' discriminatory response.
Holding. Section 111 EA 2010 liability of a third-party 'instructor' or 'causer' is not made out merely because a complaint to an employer triggers a discriminatory response; the third party's conduct must be a sufficient cause of the basic contravention on a fair statutory reading.
If an employer disciplines you over something tied to your protected belief, the tribunal must carefully weigh up whether the employer's response was actually necessary and proportionate. It cannot just take the employer's word that the action was justified.
Where there is a close or direct nexus between an employee's protected belief under s.10 EA 2010 and the conduct said to have prompted disciplinary action, a tribunal must conduct an Eweida-style proportionality assessment under Articles 9 and 10 ECHR to ask whether the employer's response was prescribed by law and necessary in pursuit of the protection of others' rights — failure to do so is an error of law.
Holding. Adverse treatment 'because of' or 'related to' the manifestation of a protected belief requires the ET to assess proportionality under ECHR Articles 9/10 (Bank Mellat steps); a failure to conduct that exercise is an error of law.
Your religious belief that sex is fixed is protected, but employers can still require you to treat vulnerable service users with the pronouns they ask for. Holding the belief is safe; refusing reasonable workplace rules to act on it is not.
Applying Forstater, the EAT held that the claimant's Christian belief in Genesis 1:27 (that sex/gender is fixed at birth) and his lack of belief in transgenderism satisfied Grainger and were protected under s.10 EA 2010, so engaged s.4; but on the facts the ET was entitled to find no direct discrimination, harassment or unjustified indirect discrimination because the respondent's PCPs were a proportionate means of meeting the needs of vulnerable service users.
Holding. A claimant's Christian belief that sex is immutable is a protected belief under s.10 EA 2010, but the DWP's actions were proportionate and not unlawful discrimination.
When a disabled employee is moved to a lower-paid role, the employer does not have to keep paying the old salary indefinitely. Budget pressures and fairness to other staff can justify a pay cut, provided the decision is proportionate on the facts.
The EAT held that an employer's refusal to maintain a disabled teacher's pre-redeployment salary indefinitely was a proportionate means of achieving the legitimate aim of operating within its budget and applying its pay policy fairly to other staff; financial considerations may justify unfavourable treatment under s.15(1)(b) EA 2010 where weighed against the disabled employee's needs.
Holding. Refusing to red-circle a higher salary for a disabled employee redeployed to a lower-graded role can be justified under s.15(1)(b) EA 2010 by reference to the employer's budgetary constraints and fairness to other staff.
Holding the view that biological sex is real and cannot be changed counts as a protected belief at work. Employers cannot lawfully sack or punish you just for holding it, though how you express it can still cross lines.
Gender-critical belief that biological sex is real and immutable satisfies all five Grainger criteria and is therefore a protected philosophical belief under s.10 — engaging s.4 as a protected characteristic; only beliefs akin to Nazism or totalitarianism (i.e. those failing to attain a minimum level of compatibility with the rights of others) are excluded under Grainger (v).
Holding. Gender-critical belief is a philosophical belief protected under s.10 EA 2010; the Grainger (v) threshold is set low and excludes only the most extreme beliefs.
If an employer treats you badly because of something that flowed from your disability, like sickness absence or slow performance, that can be unlawful even without obvious prejudice. The employer must then show its actions were a proportionate way of running the business.
Set the structured analytical framework for s.15 EA 2010 ('discrimination arising from disability'): the tribunal must (i) identify the unfavourable treatment, (ii) identify the 'something' said to have caused it, (iii) determine whether the 'something' arose in consequence of the claimant's disability (loose causation), (iv) determine whether the unfavourable treatment was because of that 'something' (operative cause), and (v) consider knowledge of the disability and any s.15(1)(b) justification.
Holding. A s.15 EA 2010 claim requires the tribunal to work through a five-step Pnaiser framework, treating the two causation questions ('something' arising from disability, and treatment because of that 'something') as separate.
Not every off-colour remark at work is unlawful harassment. A one-off, clearly unintended slip touching on a protected characteristic, not aimed at you, may fall short. The conduct has to be serious enough that it could reasonably make you feel humiliated or intimidated.
Conduct will only amount to harassment under s.26 EA 2010 if it has the requisite purpose or, judged by reference to the claimant's perception, the other circumstances and whether it is reasonable for the conduct to have that effect (s.26(4)), produces the proscribed effect; an isolated, plainly unintended use of intemperate language with no targeting of the claimant did not cross the threshold even though it touched on a protected characteristic.
Holding. Section 26 EA 2010 requires more than a passing unwelcome reference to a protected characteristic: the conduct must, judged objectively and in context, reasonably be capable of producing the proscribed effect on the claimant.
Substantial just means more than trivial. Employers cannot dismiss your disability by pointing to all the things you can still do. The tribunal looks at what you genuinely struggle with compared to ordinary daily life.
Applying Goodwin, the EAT held that when assessing whether an impairment's adverse effect on day-to-day activities is "substantial" under s.6 read with Sch 1 EA 2010, a tribunal must focus on what the claimant cannot do, or can only do with difficulty, rather than weighing it against the abilities he or she retains; the dichotomy is binary — either the effect is more than trivial or it is not.
Holding. On a s.6 disability assessment, "substantial" simply means more than trivial: the tribunal compares the disabled state with normal day-to-day functioning, not the abilities retained with those lost.
Bringing a discrimination complaint is protected, but how you raise it can still cost your job if you do it through abuse or threats. Employers must be honest about whether they are acting on the substance of the complaint or on truly separate misconduct.
An employer can lawfully dismiss for genuinely separable features of how a protected complaint is made — such as the manner, abusive language, or mental-health-driven delusional features of the complaint — without victimisation under s.27 EA 2010, provided those features can properly be distinguished from the protected act itself; tribunals should be slow to accept such severability save in clear cases.
Holding. Section 27 EA 2010 permits an employer to act for reasons properly severable from the protected act itself (e.g. manner of complaint, threats, or symptoms of mental ill-health), but the severability must be genuine, not pretextual.
What matters with reasonable adjustments is whether the employer actually took practical steps that would have helped, not whether they ran a tidy consultation process. Failing to consult is not, by itself, a breach if no useful adjustment existed.
The s.20 EA 2010 reasonable-adjustments duty is outcome-focused: a tribunal must identify the specific PCP, the substantial disadvantage and the step said to have been a reasonable adjustment, and ask whether the proposed step would have alleviated the disadvantage; an employer's failure to engage in proper consultation, while sometimes relevant, is not itself a breach of the duty.
Holding. Section 20 EA 2010 is not concerned with the process by which the employer reached its decision but with whether reasonable steps that would have alleviated substantial disadvantage were taken.
Not every opinion counts as a protected belief at work. To be protected, your belief must be genuinely held, serious, weighty, coherent, and not incompatible with basic human dignity. Strong views on ethics or politics can qualify; passing preferences do not.
Laid down the five-limb test for what amounts to a 'philosophical belief' protected under what is now s.10 EA 2010: it must (i) be genuinely held, (ii) be a belief and not an opinion or viewpoint based on the information available, (iii) concern a weighty and substantial aspect of human life and behaviour, (iv) attain a certain level of cogency, seriousness, cohesion and importance, and (v) be worthy of respect in a democratic society and not incompatible with human dignity or the fundamental rights of others.
Holding. A 'philosophical belief' protected under reg 2 of the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003 (now s.10 EA 2010) must satisfy the five Grainger criteria, including genuine holding, cogency and being worthy of respect in a democratic society.
To count as disabled at work or in services, focus on what you struggle to do day to day, not what you can still manage. The tribunal works through four steps: the impairment, its effect, how severe, and whether it lasts.
Tribunals deciding whether someone is disabled under what is now s.6 EA 2010 should apply a four-stage approach — the impairment, the adverse-effect, the substantial and the long-term conditions — focusing on what the claimant cannot do rather than the activities he or she retains.
Holding. Disability under DDA 1995 s.1 (now s.6 EA 2010) requires the tribunal to address four distinct conditions — impairment, adverse effect on day-to-day activities, substantiality, and long-term effect — focusing on what the claimant cannot do.
An employer cannot say 'I had to discriminate, the law allowed it'. The statutory-authority defence only applies where another law actually requires the discriminatory act. If the law merely lets the employer choose, they remain responsible for that choice.
The statutory-authority defence (the predecessor of Sch 22 EA 2010) only excuses an act of discrimination where the relevant enactment in terms requires the discriminatory conduct; merely permissive enactments — those that allow but do not compel — do not engage the defence and the employer remains liable.
Holding. Schedule 22 EA 2010 (statutory authority) is engaged only where the relevant statutory provision mandates the discriminatory act; permissive statutory powers cannot provide a defence.
You do not have to be transitioning from one binary sex to another to be protected. People who identify as non-binary or gender-fluid are covered by the law on gender reassignment and can claim discrimination if mistreated at work because of it.
Section 7 EA 2010's protected characteristic of gender reassignment was read as embracing a non-binary / gender-fluid identity, on the basis that the statutory language ('a person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process for the purpose of reassigning sex') covers the spectrum of gender identities and not only binary transition.
Holding. A non-binary or gender-fluid person falls within the protected characteristic of gender reassignment under s.7 EA 2010.