Yacoubi v. Tesco Ltd

EMPLOYMENT APPEAL TRIBUNAL 58 VICTORIA EMBANKMENT, LONDON EC4Y 0DS At the Tribunal On 31 January 2002 Before

In particular, she told the Tribunal some details about this and that she has a considerable amount of pain and that walking had become difficult.

The Tribunal then directed itself as to the provisions of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 and the law, and correctly directed themselves to the leading authority in this area, Clark -v- Novacold [1999] IRLR 318 , to which we shall return, on the question of identifying a proper comparator for the purposes of the establishment of less favourable treatment under section 5(1)(a) of the Act.

Question 1 is one of fact. It is common ground that dismissal was caught by section 5(1) and the finding of the Industrial Tribunal on the reasons for dismissal was stated. It is clear that was a reason which related to his disability. By the same token, in the present case, Mr Powell, very rightly and fairly, conceded that the reason Miss Lyons had been summoned to the meeting by her managers on 19 February was for a reason which related to her disability, namely her absence from work for a prolonged period.

And the Court of Appeal judgment then proceeded to analyse the language of section 5(1)(a) which they referred to as linguistically ambiguous, and reached the conclusion that the construction of section 5(1)(a), advanced on behalf of Mr Clark, was the correct one, and the one that should be applied by Tribunals dealing with issues of less favourable treatment in the context of disability discrimination.