New mum wins unfair dismissal

Jul 17 2008 by Alastair McNeill, Hamilton Advertiser

A HAMILTON mum who made a catalogue of complaints about the treatment she received from her employer, before and after her son’s birth, has been awarded over £8000 compensation for sex discrimination.

Gillian Devlin (28), who worked at the Borders and Immigration Agency, a division of the Home Office, complained she was discriminated against because she was pregnant and forced to resign from her job.

The Glasgow employment tribunal also awarded her a further £1860 in compensation for unfair dismissal.

The tribunal heard Mrs Devlin had been a higher executive officer and received favourable appraisals during her time at the agency’s Glasgow office.

She had been given the highest level of gradings and four promotions during a four-year period. Before going on maternity leave, she had been temporarily promoted to the post of senior executive officer managing the business support unit.

But she learned a re-organisation was to take place and she would not have a job to return to after maternity leave.

Upset about this, she went for an emergency scan as she was concerned her baby wasn’t moving. After her son was born in February last year, she complained after discovering her pay reverted to her previous position with a £23,500 salary.

Mrs Devlin had said it had already been agreed her temporary promotion would continue until the end of her maternity leave.

After months of attempting to resolve matters, Mrs Devlin raised a grievance complaining she had been discriminated against and that the issue had caused her stress, impacting upon quality time she should be spending with her new baby.

Mrs Devlin had initially breast-fed her son, but was unable to continue to do so, partly because of the stress.

Shortly before she returned to work on August, she discovered her July pay had been stopped.

It turned out to be another error. She was also upset at a remark made by a manager when discussing her requirement to undergo residential training away from home and her baby.

On her return to work, Mrs Devlin found a colleague had been promoted to the post of higher executive officer within the re-organised business support unit and was carrying out duties she had previously covered. She complained she should have been given an opportunity to apply for that role.

Mrs Devlin resigned on August 7, the day after being offered a post with the equality and human rights commission.

She also said the Home Office had failed to keep in touch during her maternity leave to advise of suitable posts she could have applied for, including an opportunity to join a fast-track development programme involving a rapid rise to a grade with a salary over £40,000.

The tribunal found the incident leading to the scan was not discriminatory. However, the salary shortfall, absence of her July salary, the Home Office’s failure to advise her of suitable posts including the accelerated promotion programme, colleague’s comment, and the handling of her grievance, were factors which entitled her to resign and consider herself unfairly dismissed.

Employment judge Robert Gall said she was also discriminated against on grounds of her sex.

She had to spend a substantial amount of time “fighting her corner” he said and the breastfeeding comment was “understandably seen as offensive and upsetting by the claimant.”

The tribunal said the impact of the events on Mrs Devlin, and her employers’ actions and failures to act, “must not be under-estimated.”

Mrs Devlin said: “I hope the Home Office takes on board the tribunal’s judgement to ensure senior management are fully-trained to deal with these issues and no-one else ever has to go through what I did.”