Non-payment of bonus due to warning for disability absences discriminatory (News, 16 February 2015)

Table of contents

• Impact of this case
• Background law
• Background facts and ET decision
• Judgment of the EAT

Article summary

An employer’s bonus scheme which automatically excludes persons with sickness absence warnings from the payment of a bonus will be discriminatory where (1) the absences which led to the warnings arose as a consequence of disability, and (2) the way in which scheme operates cannot be shown to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. The connection between disability and the non-payment is not too remote, even if the person administering the scheme has no knowledge of the fact that the absences which preceded the warning were related to disability. It does not matter that the issuing of the warning in the first place may not have been discriminatory. EAT: Land Registry v Houghton and others.