Dress codes and uniforms
We look at three recent employment tribunal decisions concerning dress and jewellery codes that led to successful employment tribunal claims for religious discrimination and unfair constructive dismissal.
This constructive dismissal claim against a fashion retailer was unsuccessful, but it does reveal some of the difficulties that can arise when employers in this sector require their staff to project a particular image.
This employment tribunal considered whether or not it was discrimination for a manager with health and safety concerns to ask a Muslim interviewee about her unusually long religious dress.
The employer in this tribunal case successfully defended a man's sex discrimination claim over the common issue of its dress and appearance code applying different rules to men and women.
The European Court of Human Rights has held that a Christian employee's right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion under art.9 of the European Convention on Human Rights was breached when the UK courts found that she was not discriminated against by British Airways' uniform policy, which prevented her from wearing visible items of jewellery at work.
The High Court has upheld a breach of contract claim against a housing trust that demoted a Christian manager who said on Facebook that holding civil partnership ceremonies in churches is "an equality too far".
A retailer with branches on Oxford Street and Piccadilly forced a Muslim employee who came to work wearing a headscarf to resign because it wanted to retain its "trendy" image, the employment tribunal in this case found.
In this case, an employer's religion-based intolerance led to a successful discrimination claim.
In Eweida v British Airways plc EAT/0123/08, the EAT held that a uniform policy that prohibited visible items of jewellery, unless worn in pursuance of a mandatory scriptural requirement, did not indirectly discriminate against a Christian employee who wished to display a cross over her uniform.
In Azmi v Kirklees Metropolitan Borough Council EAT/0009/07, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has dismissed an appeal against an employment tribunal's ruling that an employee who was dismissed for refusing to remove her veil while teaching had not been discriminated against on the grounds of religion or belief.
Employment law cases: HR and legal information and guidance relating to dress codes and uniforms.