Mr M Somasundaram v Employers Network for Equality and Inclusion — 2021

Mr M Somasundaram was employed by Employers Network for Equality and Inclusion from 18 June 2018 on a one-year fixed-term contract as Disability Lead. The tribunal accepted that he had polio and dyslexia, both disabilities for Equality Act purposes. It found the respondent knew of his mobility impairment from the application and interview process, but that dyslexia was first raised on 19 June 2018 after he started work. The tribunal also found that Mrs Keating did not have the ATW report said to set out the extent of the claimant's disadvantage, although she did engage proactively with ATW and agreed that he could work from home for most of the role.

The direct discrimination claims under s.13 EqA 2010 failed. The tribunal found that the initial work themes given to the claimant, including the ESC disability strategy paper, the notable dates plan and the associates network, were priority areas to develop rather than exclusive expectations, and that later expectations around webinars, Ability Networks and training arose through ongoing discussion. On the disability claim, the tribunal found the claimant had not shown facts from which disability discrimination could be inferred, and on the race claim it found the comparator evidence was inadequate. The tribunal therefore held that the burden of proof did not shift, and in any event the respondent's explanation was not because of race or disability.

The s.15 claim failed in relation to the August 2018 taster session and the later training points. The tribunal accepted that the claimant mentioned dyslexia at the 7 August meeting, but it found Mr Okuyiga's concerns were primarily about terminology, the legislative focus of the draft and confidence in delivery, with grammatical errors only a minor or trivial factor. It also found that the claimant was invited as an optional attendee to the 29 October 2018 Global Competency event, so there was no unfavourable treatment on that point. The probation extension on 6 September 2018 was held not to be unfavourable treatment, and the dismissal on 5 November 2018 was found to arise from performance concerns rather than from something arising in consequence of disability.

The s.20 reasonable adjustments claim was dismissed. The tribunal treated the alleged PCP for the first period as the requirement to produce written work of a good standard without grammatical or spelling errors, but found no proved substantial disadvantage before 20 August 2018 because the claimant did not identify a specific task he could not do without a support worker. The taxi and client-travel complaint failed because, although the tribunal accepted that walking through train stations could place him at a disadvantage, it found the respondent did not know, and could not reasonably have been expected to know, the nature and extent of that disadvantage. The lighter-laptop issue also failed because the claimant said he did not take his laptop to client meetings, and the ATW support already addressed note-taking with a digital recorder.