May, Wall, Maurice Kay LJJ
[2008] EWCA Civ 578
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 09 June 2021; Ref: scu.268001

The applicant sought appointment as a post-master, and claimed race discrimination when the respondent failed to interview or appoint him. He was required only to provide premises and to ensure that services were provided without being obliged personally to do anything.
Held: The contract which he sought as a sub-postmaster would not require him ‘personally to execute work’. These words required ‘that the person entering into a contract shall himself be under an obligation personally to do work or labour.’ and ‘It is a contract personally to execute any work or labour. That, it seems to us, quite plainly requires that the person entering into a contract shall himself be under an obligation personally to do work or labour. It may well be that some of what he undertakes to do he may delegate, but in our judgment it is essential, for there to be ’employment’, that the person making the contract shall himself undertake to do, at any rate some of the work or labour.’ The section did not apply.
References: [1981] ICR 374
Judges: Slynn P
Statutes: Race Relations Act 1976 78(1)
Jurisdiction: England and Wales
This case cites:

• Considered – Hitchcock v Post Office 1980
  . .
  ([1980] CLY 1045)

This case is cited by:

• Cited – Kelly v Northern Ireland Housing Executive; Loughran v Northern Ireland Housing Executive HL 29-Jul-1998
  Provisions against discrimination on religious grounds in Northern Ireland, could apply to appointment of a firm to a panel of experts, where one person was designated to carry out that work. ‘it is essential, for there to be ’employment,’ that the . .
  (Times 14-Sep-98, , Gazette 23-Sep-98, , [1998] 3 WLR 735, [1998] UKHL 33, [1999] 1 AC 428, [1998] ICR 828, [1998] NI 240, [1998] IRLR 593)
• Cited – Jivraj v Hashwani SC 27-Jul-2011
  The parties had a joint venture agreement which provided that any dispute was to be referred to an arbitrator from the Ismaili community. The claimant said that this method of appointment became void as a discriminatory provision under the 2003 . .
  (, [2011] UKSC 40, , , , UKSC 2010/0170, UKSC 2010/0158, [2011] IRLR 827, [2011] 32 EG 54, [2011] ArbLR 28, [2011] Bus LR 1182, [2011] ICR 1004, [2011] CILL 3076, [2011] 1 WLR 1872)

These lists may be incomplete.
Last Update: 27 November 2020; Ref: scu.194282

The Claimant was a sales executive with a small finance company. From about July 2013, following a split with a Ukrainian girlfriend, the Claimant suffered paranoid delusions that he was being followed and stalked by a Russian gang. These delusions affected his timekeeping, attendance and record-keeping (which were already a matter of concern even before 2013). However, things improved after September 2013. Whilst there were sporadic references to the Claimant’s poor attitude in that period, it was not until April 2017 that there was a worsening of the effect of the paranoid delusions on his day-to-day activities. The Claimant’s employment was terminated on 8 September 2017, ostensibly for reasons to do with capability and attitude. The Claimant lodged a claim complaining of unfair dismissal, disability discrimination and deduction of wages (amongst others). The Tribunal held that he did not have a disability within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010. However, his claim of unfair dismissal was upheld.
Held (dismissing the appeal), that the Tribunal did not err in concluding that the long-term requirement in the definition of disability was not met. The Tribunal was entitled to conclude on the evidence that, although there was a substantial adverse effect in 2013 and again in 2017, in neither case was it likely that the adverse effect would last for 12 months or that it would recur. The Tribunal had correctly applied ‘likely’ as if it meant ‘could well happen’, and had approached the question of the likelihood of recurrence correctly. The Tribunal also did not err in deciding that the Respondent did not know and could not reasonably be expected to know of the disability.
References: [2020] UKEAT 0317 – 19 – 0909
Links: Bailii
Judges: Choudhury J P
Jurisdiction: England and Wales

Last Update: 23 September 2020; Ref: scu.653918