N Elliot and D McFarlane Mr F Mooney v Lanarkshire Health Board — 2025

Mr Mooney worked as a clinical support worker in NHS Lanarkshire's Emergency Care Unit from April 2022. The tribunal accepted that the respondent's dress code applied to clinical staff engaged in direct patient care and required long hair to be worn up or off the collar. It also accepted that the unit was a medium-risk environment, with vulnerable patients, incidents of violence and aggression, and infection-control concerns.

The direct race, religion or belief, and sex discrimination complaints were dismissed. The tribunal did not accept a number of the alleged remarks or incidents relied on by the claimant, and where conversations did occur it found they were ordinary discussions about compliance with the dress code and would have been had with any employee in the same position. In relation to religion or belief, it found that tying the claimant's hair up or covering it was not inconsistent with Rastafarianism, that other staff with dreadlocks had tied or covered their hair, and that the claimant's difficulty was individual rather than something shown on the evidence to affect Rastafarians as a group. It held that the policy pursued legitimate aims of health and safety and infection prevention and control and was proportionate, applying the approach in Page, Bank Mellat and Higgs.

The harassment complaints related to race, religion or belief, and sex were also dismissed. The tribunal found that many of the alleged incidents were not established, and that the communications that did occur were professional attempts to explain or enforce the policy rather than conduct related to a protected characteristic. It concluded that the claimant had not shown unwanted conduct with the required effect of violating dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment.

The victimisation complaint failed because, although the tribunal accepted that some of the claimant's statements on 2 May 2022, 12 May 2022, 28 June 2022, 28 September 2023 and 9 October 2023 amounted to protected acts, it found no detriment was because of those acts. The tribunal held that the later steps, including the conduct process and the handling of the grievance and appeal, were taken to progress matters, manage the employment situation and respond to the claimant's own requests, not in retaliation for protected acts.

On disability, the tribunal found that the claimant had mental impairments including major depressive disorder and PTSD, but it was not satisfied those impairments were long-term or had a substantial adverse effect on day-to-day activities at the material time. It therefore held that he was not disabled for Equality Act purposes, and in any event the respondent did not know and could not reasonably have been expected to know of a disability. The section 15 complaint and the reasonable-adjustments complaint both failed, including the challenge to the March and April 2024 holiday letters and the suggested shared-care PCP.