E.T. Z (WR) EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNALS (SCOTLAND) Case No: 4103838/2022 Held at Dundee on 1, and March 2023 Employment Judge W A Meiklejohn Miss Paula Connelly v Dr Karen McConnach t/a Maid in Dundee — 2023

At a preliminary hearing on 8 November 2022, Employment Judge Jones struck out the claimant's direct discrimination and harassment claims after the claimant explained her objection to Covid vaccination as a choice to decide whether to be vaccinated. The judge held that this did not amount to a philosophical belief within section 10 EqA 2010, applying Grainger plc and others v Nicholson.

On redundancy and unfair dismissal, the tribunal accepted that the respondent's sole-trader cleaning business had declined from 31 clients when the claimant started on 30 November 2015 to 21 clients by 1 April 2022, with February income falling from £2,426 in 2016 to £1,655 in 2022. It found that the requirement for a Domestic Cleaner had diminished, that the dismissal was wholly or mainly by reason of redundancy, and that the consultation carried out in meetings on 4, 9 and 11 February 2022 was reasonable in the context of a very small business with no premises. The tribunal relied on s.139(1) and s.98(4) ERA 1996, together with Safeway Stores plc v Burrell and Polkey v A E Dayton Services Ltd. The claimant's redundancy-payment complaint was withdrawn during the hearing after the tribunal indicated the calculation was correct, and the claim was dismissed.

The itemised pay statement claim succeeded to the extent of declarations under s.8 and s.12 ERA 1996: the respondent had not given payslips at or before payment and the later payslips omitted variable deductions from the earnings arrestment, but no order for unnotified deductions was made because the last deduction on 1 April 2022 was outside the 13-week period before the ET1 lodged on 13 July 2022. The holiday pay claim failed. The tribunal found that the contract provided 28 days' annual leave including statutory days, that the informal school-holiday practice did not vary that entitlement, that the claimant had taken at least 28 days in each full year, and that she had not shown any further carry-over entitlement under regulation 13(10) and (11) of the Working Time Regulations 1998. It therefore held that the £57.60 paid on termination for accrued untaken holiday was correctly calculated.