Mr S Sophal v The Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs — 2022

The claimant, a British Indian employee of HMRC, complained that two Yammer posts were deleted on 18 May 2021. The tribunal accepted that he genuinely held a complex belief system involving a supreme being, dark forces, and his view that Covid-19 vaccination formed part of the preparatory stages of the mark of the beast. Applying the low threshold in the authorities, the tribunal found that this was a protected philosophical belief.

On race, the tribunal found that the decision-maker, Mr Crockett, may have seen the claimant's name and understood it could indicate Asian heritage, but was not influenced by the claimant's name, race or heritage. It found that the posts were deleted because of concerns about their content, including vaccine safety assertions, potential alarm or upset to staff, consistency with government policy, HMRC reputation, Yammer usage principles and the Civil Service Code. The tribunal found that a person of another race posting the same content would have been treated in the same way.

On belief, the tribunal found that Mr Crockett did not know the claimant held the protected belief as later explained to the tribunal, and that the Yammer post only partially reflected it. In any event, the tribunal found that the posts were deleted because of the way that limited part of the belief was manifested, not because the claimant held or expressed a protected belief. It held that HMRC had a legitimate interest in moderating the workplace forum in the circumstances and that the interference with expression or manifestation was proportionate. Both complaints were dismissed as not well founded.