Ms A Box v Wunderman Thompson (UK) Ltd — 2020

The tribunal heard a preliminary issue on 12 March 2021 before Employment Judge A M Snelson. Ms A Box had brought claims including unfair dismissal, discrimination arising from disability, failure to make reasonable adjustments and victimisation, but this judgment decided only whether she was disabled within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010 during the relevant period, which was agreed to be 1 April 2019 to 18 June 2020. The tribunal held that she was disabled at all relevant times.

The judge accepted that Ms Box had a mental impairment amounting to depression and anxiety, with significant symptoms first appearing in 2014 and recurring again in 2019. He found that, from summer 2014 to early 2019, her medication had suppressed symptoms that would otherwise have produced a substantial adverse effect on normal day-to-day activities, and applied the 'deduced effects' principle to treat those effects as continuing throughout that period. On that basis, the tribunal concluded that the impairment was both substantial and long-term.

In the alternative, the tribunal held that the disability test was met even if the period was considered only from early 2019 onwards. By late May 2019 it was likely, within Schedule 1 paragraph 2(1)(b), that the effects would last at least 12 months, and alternatively the effects were likely to recur under paragraph 2(2). The judge rejected the respondent's argument that the symptoms were merely reactions to life events, and also rejected the submission that alcohol consumption explained the condition, noting that no medical practitioner had attributed the mental health problems to alcohol and that abstinence had not resolved the symptoms.

The judgment therefore records that Ms Box was disabled from 2014 up to June 2020, and that all of her claims could proceed to a final hearing if the parties did not resolve the dispute.