Member J Anderson Tribunal Member J Gallagher Ms L McBryde v Scottish Ambulance Service — 2022

Ms L McBryde was an ambulance technician with the Scottish Ambulance Service. The respondent accepted that she was disabled at the relevant time by reason of PTSD. At the hearing the respondent also accepted that four hours of holiday pay remained due, so the tribunal did not determine the Working Time issue further. The live issues were whether she had been constructively dismissed, whether the band 3 pay position amounted to disability discrimination or a failure to make reasonable adjustments, and whether the pay difference was an unlawful deduction from wages.

The tribunal accepted that the claimant had a history of anxiety and PTSD following workplace incidents, but it preferred the evidence of Mr Lilly and Ms Quinn on the key disputed facts. It found that after long-term sickness the claimant asked to move to ACA duties, was placed on the redeployment register, and was interviewed by Mr Lilly in June 2020 for a permanent ACA vacancy. The tribunal found that she accepted a permanent band 3 ACA role. It noted shortcomings in paperwork and communication, but found that the respondent had made efforts to accommodate her through occupational health involvement, alternative duties, phased return arrangements, and later steps to support a return to technician work.

Applying the authorities cited on constructive dismissal, including Western Excavating, Mahmud, Wood, Lewis, Waltham Forest and Kaur, the tribunal held that there had been no breach of the implied term of mutual trust and confidence and no cumulative course of conduct amounting to a repudiatory breach. It found that the claimant had not been forced to work as an ACA, had not been forced to stop practising as an AT without proper reason, and that the requirement for assessment and training before resuming technician duties was reasonable given the period away from frontline practice. The unfair constructive dismissal claim was therefore dismissed.

On the Equality Act claims, the tribunal held that the section 15 claim failed because the band 3 pay position followed the claimant's own request for the ACA role rather than any unfavourable treatment because of disability. The reasonable adjustments claim also failed because, on the facts found, the pay and role arrangement reflected the claimant's requested move and it was not a reasonable adjustment to pay band 5 while she was working in band 3. The unlawful deduction claim failed because the contractual position had changed and band 3 wages were properly payable; the tribunal also held that, in any event, the claim was out of time. No tribunal award was made.