- IN PERSON FOR THE v Respondent — 2020

The claimant, a social worker employed by South Gloucestershire Council, brought claims arising from disability-related adjustments, alleged disability discrimination/harassment, constructive dismissal and an alleged deduction from wages. The tribunal accepted that she had both a physical disability, Ehlers Danlos / Joint Hypermobility syndrome, and a long-term mental impairment, CPTSD, but it refused an amendment sought during the hearing to add new reasonable-adjustment allegations based on CPTSD, applying the Selkent approach and finding the respondent would be prejudiced by introducing new claims at that stage.

Most of the reasonable-adjustments case failed. The 2015 hot-desking/equipment claim was dismissed because the tribunal found the respondent did not know, and could not reasonably have known, that the physical condition engaged the duty at that time, and the equipment claimed was not supported by the occupational-health evidence. The parking claims for 2015-16 and after the February 2017 transfer also failed: the tribunal found parking access had been provided by March 2016, and in 2017 the claimant had access to disabled parking bays. The managing-attendance claim failed because the tribunal found the respondent had agreed a six-week phased return and reduced hours, and there was no evidence that a longer phased return was needed.

The only successful reasonable-adjustments issue was the workstation-equipment claim after the February 2017 transfer. The tribunal found that the respondent should have ensured the existing adjustments were in place when the claimant moved to the Badminton Road site, and that there was a failure to provide a functioning rise-and-fall desk for a period after 6 February 2017. It held that time should be extended under the British Coal v Keeble factors, with Matusowicz v Kingston upon Hull City Council used to identify the reasonable date for compliance. The android smartphone element of the claim was rejected. The tribunal said remedy would be dealt with separately and indicated that any award would appear limited to injury to feelings.

The allegations of direct discrimination and harassment were dismissed. The 29 May 2015 'need to choose' note was found to reflect a genuine workload concern, the November 2015 performance-review comments were found to be an accurate record of the claimant's own comments, and the 14 June 2017 grievance comment about the claimant being fragile and under EMDR treatment was found to be a supportive explanation of prior supervision notes and not to have the proscribed effect under s.26 Equality Act 2010. The constructive-dismissal claim failed because none of the relied-on events, individually or cumulatively, amounted to a final straw or breach of the implied term of trust and confidence, and the unlawful-deduction claim for £73.80 also failed.