Maternity Rights

Maternity Rights

The Employment Appeal Tribunal have held that sending a female employee an important email to an inaccessible address whilst she is on maternity leave amounts to unfavourable treatment under the Equality Act 2010.

In SW Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust v Jackson the Claimant was put at risk of redundancy.  Her employers sent her details of redeployment opportunities to her work email address which she did not have access to due to being on maternity leave.  Subsequently, she did not find out about these opportunities for several days and although it did not cause any significant harm her claim for unfavourable treatment under section 18(4) of the Equality Act 2010 succeeded.  

The Employment Tribunal held that she did not receive the email regarding redeployment ‘because’ she was on maternity leave.  However, the EAT allowed the appeal on this ground because the ET did not consider the issue of causation properly.

If you require any advice relating to employment rights whilst on Maternity Leave or in relation to any other employment matter do not hesitate to contact a member of our Employment Team.