Ms G Mangwanya v National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux Heard: Leeds — 2023

Ms G Mangwanya was employed by National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux from 9 September 2019 to 2 September 2020 on a fixed-term Support Assistant contract in the Scams Action project. The tribunal found that the Support Assistant role had been created for project funding, paid about £1,800 less than the Service Support Assistant role because it was less autonomous, and was not advertised for a particular racial group. It also found that the later decision not to renew the contract followed a review of the Scams budget and referral levels, which reduced funding to 0.4 of a full-time role. Lara Stanley investigated the claimant's grievance and upheld two points about the handling of probation and the informal grievance, but found no evidence of discrimination.

On the race claims, the tribunal rejected the allegations that training, workload allocation, acting-up arrangements, probation extension, recruitment of Paul and Maytal, or the non-renewal decision were because of race. It found that many of the incidents had not been put to witnesses as race-based, that the claimant had voluntarily stepped down from the acting SSA role, and that the evidence did not provide the 'something more' required under Madarassy or the causal basis required by the burden of proof authorities. Applying the reason-why approach in Shamoon, the tribunal was not satisfied that there was an inference of race discrimination or race-related harassment. It also held that allegations before 29 July 2020 were out of time because ACAS early conciliation started on 28 October 2020, there was no continuing act under Hendricks, and there was no basis for a just and equitable extension.

On disability, the tribunal accepted that the respondent did not have actual or constructive knowledge of a disability arising from the claimant's back condition until 13 May 2020, and did not know she was likely to be placed at a substantial disadvantage until 20 May 2020. It found that the service level agreements were team targets which could be adjusted and that the claimant had not shown a substantial disadvantage before knowledge arose. After the claimant raised the issue, a desk adjuster was provided and, when that proved unsuitable, an adjustable desk was obtained; referring the claimant to Dell over the faulty equipment was reasonable. The section 15 claim about excessive working hours also failed because it was not established that the claimant was working extra hours because of something arising from her disability.

The religion or belief allegations were dismissed. The tribunal found no credible evidence that the managers' references to Whitehall or LifeWorks were because of the claimant's Christian beliefs, and said those references were attempts to assist with work-related stress. It also recorded that no questions had been put to witnesses on those allegations. The tribunal similarly rejected victimisation: it was not satisfied that any protected act was linked to the later treatment, the anonymous survey did not involve less favourable treatment, and the wig-and-glasses incident could not support victimisation because no protected act was identified.