Mr Zahir Khan v The Secretary of State for Justice — 2023

The preliminary hearing concerned four of five claims against the respondent, identified as the third, sixth, seventh and eleventh claims. The claimant did not attend. Previous postponement requests had been refused, and the tribunal proceeded in his absence after considering his correspondence and the respondent's submissions. For the purpose of the strike out application, the tribunal took the claimant's case at its highest, including treating him as disabled by all claimed impairments and treating the respondent as having actual or constructive knowledge, without making findings on those matters.

The claims arose from unsuccessful job applications and were framed as failures to make reasonable adjustments in recruitment. The tribunal considered alleged PCPs including requiring written applications, requiring candidates to demonstrate competencies by reference to experience, using word limits and scoring thresholds, considering grammar, and not engaging in post-application correspondence. It found no reasonable prospect of the claimant showing that those matters placed him at a comparative substantial disadvantage because of disability, or that the requested adjustments would have been reasonable.

The tribunal found that the claimant had work, education and voluntary experience from which he could draw, but had used weak or repeated examples across applications and sometimes did not address the relevant behaviour being assessed. It also found no evidence that grammar or word limits had materially affected his scores, and no reasonable prospect of showing that assessed work experience, lowering the minimum threshold, or removing the requirement to demonstrate competencies by experience would be reasonable adjustments. The tribunal concluded that the claims before it were among the clearest cases where discrimination claims could be struck out and struck them out under rule 37, so it did not consider deposit orders.