This month we cover two cases on managing the expression of beliefs, and a part-time discrimination case. We also report on the annual whistleblowing statistics from the Bank of England and the PRA produced in their capacity as prescribed persons who receive whistleblowing complaints about Firms.
We will not hear more about Labour's legislative reform of employment law, now the House of Commons has risen for its summer recess. It will sit again on Monday 2 September. The Employment Reform Bill is expected to be one of the first King's speech Bills published once Parliamentary business resumes. For more detail about this Bill, please see our earlier alert here.
In the meantime, readers will be aware that the new duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of their employees applies from 26 October 2024. The EHRC's consultation on their updated guidance closed on 6 August. Concerns about the EHRC's approach that the new law applies to third party harassment have been raised with them through this consultation. We shall update readers on what the final guidance says once it has been published. For more information about this, please see our alert here.
1. Belief Discrimination: Stonewall did not cause or induce the discrimination of a barrister by her Chambers.
In this case the EAT upheld a tribunal's decision that Stonewall did not cause or induce Garden Court Chambers to discriminate against a barrister.
2. Religious discrimination: A Christian social worker was discriminated against when a conditional job offer was withdrawn but not by a later refusal to confirm offer.
In this case an employment tribunal found a charity directly discriminated against a job applicant when it withdrew a conditional job offer after discovering Facebook posts expressing views on same sex marriage and homosexuality.
3. Part-time discrimination: Charging full and part-time drivers the same flat rate fee did not breach Part-Time Workers Regulations.
In this case the EAT held that a part-time driver's less favourable treatment did not breach the Part-Time Workers (Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment) Regulations 2000 because his treatment was not solely on the ground that he worked part-time.
4. Bank of England and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) publish 2023/24 annual report as Prescribed Persons.
The annual report, published on 30 July 2024, covers the whistleblowing disclosures received by the Bank of England (BoE) and the PRA during the period 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024.
