The claimant worked in Lagan Valley Hospital as a Band 5 Nurse. The claimant also suffered from the genetic condition ‘hemochromatosis. Concerns arose as to the claimant’s practice at work, inter alia, her involvement with the family of a patient. She claimed that she was resultantly unsupported in her work.

The tribunal found that the claimant was not always cooperative towards her management. The claimant requested to be redeployed and was offered numerous alternatives with varying hours but refused all of the options for family reasons.

One major concern of the respondent was the fact that the claimant was accessing her own medical test results contrary to the system’s rules. There continued to be a difficult working relationship between the claimant and management.

In August 2012, the claimant went on sick leave and to the date of hearing had not returned to her job. She claimed that reasonable adjustments had not been made for her condition, direct discrimination, discrimination based on her disability since she was denied a redeployment opportunity based on the fact that she was on sick leave and also harassment on grounds of disability.

The claimant’s assertions that reasonable adjustments were not made were wholly rejected. Whilst she claimed that the hours of the post could have been redesigned to suit her, it was held that substantial adjustments were made for her e.g. to allow for attendance at appointments. In relation to direct discrimination, it was held that there were genuine practical reasons why the claimant was not suitable for the redeployed post. Considerations such as the fact that they required the post to be filled urgently and by a full-time worker were given weight by the tribunal.

On the harassment issue the tribunal relied on the decision of Richmond Pharmacology v Dhaliwal [2009] IRLR EAT. The tribunal was unequivocal that the claimant’s assertions in this regard were unreasonable and intimated that in fact it was her adverse reaction to events that created the undesirable working atmosphere. Applying the Dhaliwal test, the claimant’s perceptions of harassment were rejected.

Practical lessons from this decision

The central focus of the claimant’s case was that she had been discriminated against on the grounds of her disability by way of the withdrawal of the redeployment opportunity. The tribunal pointed to the following factors in finding that the respondent had acted reasonably:

a) She was unable to take up the post with immediate effect because of her ongoing sickness absence

b) She could not work full-time and the post was a full-time one.

Where a respondent can show clear, substantiated reasons why the post was not suitable for the claimant then this is strong evidence to counter a direct discrimination claim. The tribunal termed these factors as ‘eligibility requirements’ which, if demonstrated, prevent the burden of proof shifting to the respondent to disprove unlawful discrimination.