Prior to the Equality Act 2010 disability discrimination was covered by direct and indirect discrimination. These two heads of claim were good fits for discrimination based on sex and race but didn’t quite map onto employees experiences of discriminatory behaviour by their employer.
This problem was resolved with the introduction of s.15 in the EA2010 with Discrimination Arising from Disability. It requires the claimant to identify two components
- unfavourable treatment
- what did the discrimination arise from
Imagine a situation where an employee with a disability is given a disciplinary sanction for having too many absences. In this example the disability could be a mental health issue or a physical impairment such as back disorder.
The unfavourable treatment is being subjected to a disciplinary sanction. This arises from the absence rate of the employee. In other words they were disciplined for having too much time off (which arose from their disability).
To include this within a s.15 breach you would need to provide information concerning
- who eg name
- how eg verbal/letter
- date eg full calendar date
So if you feel your employee has breached this law within the EA2010 bring this to their attention whether through a polite reminder or a grievance.