Miss G Okwu v The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust — 2024

Miss G Okwu started work for The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust on 19 November 2019 as a family support worker in the Returning Families Unit. She brought claims of direct race discrimination, race harassment and victimisation. The tribunal heard evidence over several days from the claimant and from managers and colleagues, including Sandra Marinou, Jane Penfold, Dr Mike Shaw, Hulya Karabulut, Dayo Ajibola and Tim Kent. It found the unit was small, work allocation depended on family need and practitioner expertise, and the period included team turnover, commissioning uncertainty and the pandemic.

On direct race discrimination, the tribunal rejected the complaints that the claimant was not given work for the first two months of employment, that she was not given monthly supervision, that salary issues in 2022 and 2023 were race-based, that Dr Shaw's monkey anecdote was racially motivated, that Ms Penfold wrongly accessed occupational health material, that TB testing and vaccination were delayed because of race, and that Mr Kent's discussion about the claimant's role was discriminatory. In each area it accepted the respondent's explanation or found no facts from which race-based less favourable treatment could properly be inferred. The tribunal accepted that some matters were frustrating or unreasonable, but concluded that they were explained by service instability, administrative error, the pandemic, or efforts to resolve the claimant's concerns, not by race.

On harassment, the tribunal accepted that the claimant found the 24 March 2023 monkey anecdote upsetting and that she was genuinely sensitive to the racial history of monkey references. It nevertheless found that Dr Shaw was using a clinical anecdote to illustrate a point, that he did not have a racial purpose, and that the remark did not reasonably amount to conduct related to race with the proscribed effect under s.26 Equality Act 2010. The same approach was taken to the occupational health records issue and the TB vaccination delay: both were unwanted and caused frustration, but the tribunal found they were not race-related and did not constitute harassment on the facts it accepted.

On victimisation, the tribunal held that the grievance of 18 March 2021 and the May 2023 grievance were protected acts, but the 3 November 2022 pay complaint was not because it did not itself allege discrimination or another Equality Act matter. It found that a delayed response to the claimant's DSAR and the decision to have Mr Kent handle part of the May 2023 grievance could be regarded as detriments, but it found no causal link between those matters and the protected acts. It also rejected the allegation that the 18 March 2021 grievance had been stripped of its race element, and it held that the handling of the grievances, including the May 2023 process, was not shown to have been influenced by the claimant's protected acts. All claims were dismissed and no remedy was awarded.