Mr L Zhuwao v SD Design (UK) Ltd — 2019

Mr L Zhuwao brought claims of direct race discrimination and race harassment against SD Design (UK) Ltd. The tribunal held a liability-only hearing and dismissed both claims. It found that the respondent was a small design business, that Mr Zhuwao worked as a structural engineer from 27 March 2017 to 16 April 2018, and that the relevant decision-makers were Ms Dowling and Mr Smart.

On the direct discrimination allegations, the tribunal accepted that the respondent had agreed in principle to pay for AutoCAD training, but held that the October 2017 decision not to progress the course at that point was a timing and cost decision, not race-based treatment. It also found that Mr Zhuwao was given the same basic contractual letter as other employees, that overtime was only asked for and paid when work schedules were tight, and that the specific December 2017 Saturday work was voluntary rather than comparable to the 3D modellers' overtime. The tribunal similarly rejected the printer, Tekla licence, early-leaving, computer, and March 2018 comments complaints on the basis that the comparators were in materially different circumstances or that the respondent's explanations were business-related.

The harassment complaint concerned alleged December 2017 comments about an Asian Techrete employee. The tribunal found that the remarks were comments about Techrete employees generally and about frustration with the issuing of drawings, not comments related to race. It therefore held that the comments were not unwanted conduct related to race and, in any event, were not shown to have the purpose or effect required by section 26 of the Equality Act 2010. On dismissal, the tribunal accepted that Techrete's loss of work in March 2018 caused a sudden downturn and that the respondent cut costs by reducing outside work and stopping recruitment. It found that Mr Zhuwao's engineering role was distinct from the CAD technician and 3D modeller roles, so the decision to dismiss him rather than the others was explained by the business need to reduce engineering headcount. The tribunal noted that the consultation process was poor and said that, if this had been an unfair dismissal case, Mr Zhuwao would likely have succeeded on procedural grounds, but it held that the dismissal was not because of race.