Claimant v McDonald v Amber Valley Borough Council — 2023

The claimant, who remained employed as the respondent's Principal Solicitor and Deputy Monitoring Officer, had already been accepted as disabled by reason of breast cancer. This hearing on 8 June 2023 concerned whether additional alleged impairments, including chemo brain, urticaria, colitis, stress, anxiety and depression, also satisfied section 6 of the Equality Act 2010. The tribunal noted that the case had become confused by the number of pleaded conditions and determined all the alleged impairments that were before it.

The tribunal rejected the case on chemo brain. It found that the claimant did not mention memory or concentration problems until she was challenged about the attendance recording system and later the laptop incident, and there was no medical record supporting chemo brain before she raised it with her GP on 8 December 2022. Urticaria also failed as a disability because the evidence showed a flare-up around November 2021 and no serious flare for about seven years, which was insufficient to show a long-term adverse effect on normal day-to-day activities.

By contrast, the tribunal found that colitis was a disability. It was first noted in occupational health records, was diagnosed as chronic colitis in October 2021, and caused abdominal pain and urgent toilet needs affecting ordinary activities such as socialising, shopping and family life. The tribunal also held that stress was a long-term mental impairment: GP notes and occupational health evidence described prolonged work-related stress, disrupted sleep, panic responses to employer correspondence and adverse effects on physical symptoms. It did not find anxiety and depression separately established, because the evidence pointed to stress rather than a distinct diagnosed anxiety or depressive disorder.