ETZ 4(WR) IN THE EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNAL (SCOTLAND) AT EDINBURGH Judgment of the Tribunal in Case No: S/4103438/2018 Issued Following Continued Open Preliminary Hearing Heard at Edinburgh on th January 2019 Employment Judge: J G d’Inverno, QVRM, TD, VR, WS (Sitting Alone)10 Miss C Jeffcoat v Represented by:- Mr B Shafe, Solicitor Hudson Business Centre Ltd st and 1 other — 2019

This was a continued open preliminary hearing on disability status only. The tribunal first heard the issue on 24 July 2018, when it considered the claimant’s pleadings and oral evidence insufficiently specific and directed her to produce a diagnostic report and further particulars. The matter then returned on 28 January 2019 after the claimant lodged a dyslexia assessment report by Dr Sionah Lannen dated 28 September 2018 and gave further evidence about the effects of dyslexia in work and daily life.

The tribunal found that the claimant had first been diagnosed with dyslexia by Mrs Margaret Bruce around 2000 and that Dr Lannen’s report diagnosed dyslexia as a lifelong condition. It accepted the claimant’s evidence that during the relevant period she experienced difficulties with reading, spelling, processing speed, working memory, visual tracking, computer work, and day-to-day tasks such as reading instructions, handling emails, navigation, and sequencing work tasks. It held that these difficulties were causally connected to her dyslexia.

Although the claimant’s ET1 contained a statement that her dyslexia did not significantly affect her ability to perform her duties as a receptionist/telephonist, the tribunal accepted the respondent’s point that this created a contradiction, but concluded that the claimant’s coping mechanisms did not negate disability and that the effect of the impairment was not merely minor or trivial. It therefore found, on the balance of probabilities, that from 1 April 2016 up to and including 12 March 2018 the claimant was a person possessing the protected characteristic of disability within section 6 of the Equality Act 2010, and that she had title to present disability discrimination complaints, subject to any remaining jurisdictional issues to be determined later.