Mrs L Johnson (in person, assisted by Mr Johnson) For the v Mr J Munro (Solicitor) — 2023

The claimant brought claims of unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal, disability and sex discrimination, holiday pay, and unlawful deductions. By agreement, the tribunal first determined a preliminary issue: whether she was disabled within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010. The claim and the subsequent reasoning focused on that issue alone; the merits of the remaining claims were not decided in this judgment.

The tribunal accepted the claimant's evidence that pressure at work increased as Primary Care Networks developed and later during the Covid-19 pandemic, and that her father's serious illness added to that pressure. It found that by around Christmas 2020 she was starting to struggle, and by May 2021 she was unable to prioritise tasks, was struggling to concentrate, was crying at work, was sleeping badly, and felt exhausted. It also accepted that she had panic and anxiety attacks, social withdrawal, and difficulty dealing with both work correspondence and her own domestic correspondence. Those effects were found to be more than minor or trivial and to affect normal day-to-day activities such as sleeping, reading, correspondence, concentration, prioritisation, and social interaction.

Applying the Equality Act 2010 definition and the authorities it cited, the tribunal found sufficient evidence of a mental impairment of stress and anxiety, supported by the medical records from November 2021 onward. It rejected the submission that the claimant was merely experiencing the ordinary effects of a high workload. Although the medical notes referred to some improvement at points, the tribunal concluded the adverse effects remained ongoing, and that by 7 December 2021 the claimant had experienced them for about seven months and they could well last 12 months or more. It therefore found that she was disabled by reason of stress and anxiety from 7 December 2021 and remained disabled at all material times thereafter. No remedy was assessed in this decision.