Ms I Ferber, Counsel For the v Respondent — 2019

At a preliminary hearing in Watford on 12 July 2019, Employment Judge Manley determined the claimant’s disability status for the purposes of the pending disability discrimination case. The respondent conceded that the claimant was disabled within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010 in relation to depression from May 2017.

The dispute was whether back pain also amounted to a disability, and from when. The tribunal reviewed the claimant’s medical records, including earlier intermittent back pain, the May 2017 workplace injury, and the January 2018 entries recording ongoing back pain after lifting cases of wine. It accepted Mr Cleary’s evidence that the claimant was stiff and restricted after the January 2018 incident.

Judge Manley found that the claimant had a physical impairment of back pain and that from January 2018 the effect of his back pain, taken alone or together with depression, had a substantial adverse effect on normal day-to-day activities. The tribunal did not find that he was disabled before January 2018, because there was insufficient evidence that the earlier back pain met the statutory test. The claim was allowed to proceed on the basis that the claimant was disabled because of depression throughout his employment and because of back pain and/or the combination of back pain and depression from January 2018 onwards.