MRS C J CHUKWU v R1 - Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust R2 - Nursing and Midwifery Council Heard: by Cvp — 2026

At the preliminary hearing on 17 and 18 June 2026, Employment Judge McTigue struck out Mrs Chukwu’s indirect race discrimination claim against the Nursing and Midwifery Council and her race-related harassment complaint against Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust. Four direct race discrimination allegations against the Trust were made subject to deposit orders. Mrs Chukwu had worked for the Trust as a nurse since 15 May 2023 and remained employed. The Trust referred her to the Council on 1 May 2024 over alleged performance concerns.

The harassment complaint concerned an alleged comment about body odour and a demand to change clothes by a senior A&E staff member in 2023. Despite four preliminary hearings, Mrs Chukwu had supplied neither a date nor an identity beyond a first name unknown to the Trust. Taking the allegation at its highest, the judge concluded that even if the comment and its alleged effect were proved, it was not related to race. The judge rejected the submission that it was a racial stereotype or trope and found no reasonable prospect of success.

The first direct discrimination allegation concerned Laura Brett allegedly assigning Mrs Chukwu five unstable patients on 23 April 2024, despite an action plan limiting her to two patients, without health care assistant support and with her supervising nurse removed. The judge considered that the original claim form attributed the workload to the supervisor’s reassignment, which conflicted with the later account that Laura Brett allocated the patients because of race. The racial basis remained unexplained. The allegation had little reasonable prospect of success, but a factual dispute required resolution at a final hearing.

The suspension and investigation allegations also lacked an explanation of why the treatment was because of race. For the investigation allegation, Mrs Chukwu had not explained what made the investigation flawed. A letter in the Trust’s bundle indicated that Jo Foster and Debbie Bray had not investigated her, but the judge had not heard evidence on that issue. Both allegations had little reasonable prospect of success. The judge declined to strike them out because factual disputes remained for a final hearing.

The allegation that Michelle Hailey referred Mrs Chukwu to the Council likewise lacked an explanation connecting the referral to race. The judge considered it plausible that the proposed comparators were in different circumstances. However, the judge found little, rather than no, reasonable prospect of success and held that the factual dispute required evidence at a final hearing.

The indirect discrimination claim against the Council failed the strike-out threshold because the judge concluded that Mrs Chukwu could not establish any of the three alleged provisions, criteria or practices. They ran contrary to the Nursing and Midwifery Order 2001 and the Council’s Fitness to Practice Rules 2004. The third allegation also failed to identify what policies the Council should have implemented to mitigate racial disparities. The judge further considered that the Council’s statutory duty under article 22 to investigate all referrals, regardless of race or ethnicity, appeared to provide a defence that its practice was a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.