Miss S Douglas v Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council — 2023

The hearing was limited to a preliminary issue under section 6 Equality Act 2010: whether Miss Douglas had a disability at the relevant time for her wider claims, which she said included constructive unfair dismissal, race discrimination, disability discrimination and victimisation. The tribunal found that her left-eye blindness and related TIAs were a physical impairment, and that each TIA had a substantial adverse effect when it occurred because it involved temporary blindness and associated cognitive and memory effects.

On the evidence, the condition was not a disability in March 2021. The occupational health report dated 24 March 2021 recorded a small risk of further TIAs, but the judge held that this was not enough to show that recurrence was likely, so the impairment was not then long-term. The tribunal accepted that Miss Douglas had further TIAs on or around 4 June 2021 and again on 8 June 2021, and relied in particular on the later occupational health report of 14 July 2021, which described the outlook as guarded and said the symptoms remained too severe for work. The judge found that, by 8 June 2021, the substantial adverse effect was likely to recur and the impairment had become long-term, so Miss Douglas had a disability from that date.

The tribunal did not find that anxiety met the statutory test. Although Miss Douglas described anxiety, low mood, crying, difficulty functioning and social withdrawal from around June 2021 to February 2022, there was no evidence that the condition had lasted or was likely to last for 12 months, or that recurrence was likely. The judge also held that the GP note of 17 November 2020 referring to stress and burnout did not by itself prove a disability at that earlier point. The decision considered the effect of medication, but found no evidence that treatment would have made the claimant disabled earlier or changed the outcome for anxiety.