Ms. M. Glover v Lacoste UK Ltd and 1 other — 2022

Ms Glover, an assistant store manager at Lacoste's Nottingham store, asked before returning from maternity leave to work 24 hours a week on fixed days with some alternative Saturdays because of childcare. The respondent initially refused, offered four days a week on any day on appeal, and then, after the claimant's solicitor asked for reconsideration, granted her original three-day pattern before she returned to work. A separate flexible working complaint under the Employment Rights Act 1996 had been put behind a deposit order and was not pursued.

The tribunal allowed an amendment to the pleaded PCPs so the case could include a requirement to be fully flexible. It held that full-time working alone did not of itself put women with childcare responsibilities at a particular disadvantage, but that a requirement to work flexibly, especially at weekends and on short notice, did create group disadvantage because childcare arrangements are less adaptable for that pattern. The tribunal relied on the indirect discrimination framework in section 19 Equality Act 2010 and the authorities it cited on childcare disadvantage and proportionality.

The claim nevertheless failed because the tribunal held that the respondent's refusal was reversed before the claimant ever had to work on the disputed flexible terms, so section 19(1)(c) was not made out. It preferred the approach in Little v Richmond Pharmacology Ltd and distinguished cases where the adverse term had actually been applied. In the alternative, it said the respondent had not justified the rigid full-time fully flexible requirement on the evidence it heard, but that point did not alter the outcome. The claimant returned on the agreed hours on 8 May 2021, the arrangement was later made permanent, and her employment ended in redundancy on 19 November 2021.

Because the discrimination claim failed, there was no actual award. In its alternative remedy discussion the tribunal said any injury to feelings award would have been £1,500 for a short period of distress between 7 and 23 April 2021, rejected the late medical evidence said to support a personal injury claim, and would not have awarded aggravated damages.