UK Cases Database –Discrimination on Grounds of Religion or Belief:
Case Name
Facts
Ruling
Principle
Links
Grainger plc
v Nicholson,
EAT
 This is an appeal by the Respondent, Grainger
plc, against the decision of Regional
Employment Judge Sneath on 18 March 2009,
by reasons sent to the parties on 1 April 2009,
after a pre-hearing review, that the Claimant
was entitled to pursue a claim under the
Employment Equality (Religion or Belief)
Regulations 2003 ("the 2003 Regulations").
 I conclude that it is not a bar to a philosophical
belief being protected by the Regulations if it is
a one-off belief and not shared by others, a
fortiori where it is likely that others do share the
belief. Pacifism and vegetarianism can both be
described as one-off beliefs in the sense in
which I understand it to be being used by Mr.
Bowers, namely a belief that does not govern
the entirety of a person's life.
 It may be possible for someone to
establish such a philosophical belief, but it
is certainly not necessary in order for Miss
Rose's argument to succeed. The
existence of a positive philosophical belief
does not depend upon the existence of a
negative philosophical belief to the
contrary.
http://www.ba
ilii.org/uk/cas
es/UKEAT/20
09/0219_09_
0311.html
 The issue was whether the belief assuredly
held by the Claimant, Mr. Nicholson, was
capable of being a belief for the purposes of
the 2003 Regulations. At the Tribunal, the
Claimant was in person and the Respondent
was represented by Junior Counsel. Before
me, the fullest possible consideration of the
point has been given by Leading Counsel now
instructed on either side, John Bowers QC for
the Appellant and Dinah Rose QC, with Ivan
Hare, for the Respondent employee.
 In my judgment, if a person can establish that
he holds a philosophical belief which is based
on science, as opposed, for example, to
religion, then there is no reason to disqualify it
from protection by the Regulations.
Eweida v
British
Airways
plc, CA
 The claimant, who is a devout practicing Christian, has
worked part-time as a member of check-in staff for the
respondent since 1999. As her job is customer facing, she
is required to wear uniform. As the respondent operates a
24 hour operation throughout the year, she is required to
work in a shift pattern. The claimant complained of a
number of incidents between 2003 and 2006 which she
said showed anti-Christian bias on the part of the
respondent.
 Until 2004 the claimant's uniform included a high necked
blouse, and she wore a silver cross on a necklace
underneath the blouse when she wished to. Starting in
2004, the respondent introduced a newly designed
uniform, which we call the Macdonald uniform, which
included provision for an open neck, but which prohibited
the wearing of any visible item of adornment around the
neck. Between 20 May and 20 September 2006 the
claimant came to work on at least three occasions with the
cross visible under her uniform. When asked to conceal it
she did so. When on 20 September she refused to conceal
the cross, she was sent home.
 The claimant remained at home, unpaid, from 20
September until the following February. She initiated and
pursued the respondent's grievance procedures. A storm
of media attention, much of it hostile to the respondent, led
the respondent to reconsider its uniform policy and to
introduce an amended policy on 1 February 2007. The
amended policy permitted staff to display a faith or charity
symbol with the uniform. The claimant returned to work on
3 February 2007 and is still employed by the respondent.
 Indirect discrimination, if it occurs, is not
necessarily wrongful: the defendant
employer may show that, in spite of its
negative effect, the provision, criterion or
practice, despite its unequal impact,
constitutes a proportionate means of
achieving a legitimate aim.
 It is one thing to find a lack of justification for
a requirement which affects Christians as a
whole in BA's workforce, which is how the
case was put to the tribunal and therefore
formed the hypothesis on which they
considered justification. It is another to do so
in relation to a requirement which (assuming
the law to be as Ms Monaghan contends it
is) has turned out to disadvantage a single
employee who after 6 or 7 years of
compliance with the dress code has decided
that it is no longer compatible with her
beliefs.
 The protection afforded to those
holding a religious or philosophical
belief is a broad one. The belief can
be intensely personal and
subjective. Accordingly, it is not
necessary for a belief to be shared
by others in order for it to be a
religious belief, nor need a specific
belief be a mandatory requirement of
an established religion for it to
qualify as a religious belief.
 The definition of indirect
discrimination envisages that the
claimant is placed at a disadvantage
suffered by others who share her
religion or belief. There must be
evidence of group disadvantage,
and the onus is on the claimant to
prove this. In order for indirect
discrimination to be established, it
must be possible to make some
general statements which would be
true about a religious group such
that an employer ought reasonably
to be able to appreciate that any
particular provision may have a
disparate adverse impact on the
group. This means that if someone
holds subjective personal religious
views, he or she is protected only by
direct and not indirect discrimination.
http://www.ba
ilii.org/ew/cas
es/EWCA/Civ
/2010/80.html
http://www.ba
ilii.org/ew/cas
es/EWCA/Civ
/2009/1025.ht
ml
Ladele v
London
Borough of
Islington,
CA
 Having worked for Islington for the previous ten
years, Ms Ladele became one of their registrars
of Births, Marriages and Deaths on 14
November 2002.
 Ms Mendez-Child wrote to Ms Ladele saying
that her refusal to officiate at civil partnerships
would be viewed by Islington as discriminatory,
indeed, potentially as gross misconduct, and
threatening formal disciplinary action. The letter
offered Ms Ladele a "temporary measure" of
only having to officiate at civil partnerships
which involved no ceremonies. Ms Ladele did
not accept that offer, but replied on 18 April,
reiterating and explaining her views in moderate
and clear terms, saying that she was being
asked to "facilitate the formation of a union
which [she] sincerely believe[d] was contrary to
God's law", and inviting Islington to
accommodate her belief.
 t appears to me that the fact that Ms Ladele's
refusal to perform civil partnerships was based
on her religious view of marriage could not justify
the conclusion that Islington should not be
allowed to implement its aim to the full, namely
that all registrars should perform civil
partnerships as part of its Dignity for All policy.
Ms Ladele was employed in a public job and was
working for a public authority; she was being
required to perform a purely secular task, which
was being treated as part of her job; Ms Ladele's
refusal to perform that task involved
discriminating against gay people in the course
of that job; she was being asked to perform the
task because of Islington's Dignity for All policy,
whose laudable aim was to avoid, or at least
minimize, discrimination both among Islington's
employees, and as between Islington (and its
employees) and those in the community they
served; Ms Ladele's refusal was causing offence
to at least two of her gay colleagues; Ms
Ladele's objection was based on her view of
marriage, which was not a core part of her
religion; and Islington's requirement in no way
prevented her from worshipping as she wished.
 If one starts with Ms Ladele's wish
not to officiate at civil partnerships,
and assumes that Islington's
justification for not accommodating
that wish was simply their desire to
have an effective system for
registering civil partnerships, then it
is easy to see the force of this
argument.
http://www.baili
i.org/ew/cases/E
WCA/Civ/2009
/1357.html
McFarlane v  The employers are part of the Relate
Federation ("Relate"). As is well known
Relate,
CA
Relate provides relationship counseling
services. It is a member of the British
Association for Sexual and Relationship
Therapy ("BASRT"). BASRT has a Code of
Ethics which requires the therapist to "avoid
discrimination... on grounds of... sexual
orientation" (paragraph 19). The employers
themselves have an equal opportunities
policy which requires them to ensure "that no
person... receives less favorable treatment on
the basis of characteristics, such as... sexual
orientation.
 The applicant entered into a contract of
employment with the employers as a paid
counselor in August 2003. Upon doing so he
signed up expressly to the employers' equal
opportunities policy. The applicant is a
Christian who (in the words of the EAT,
paragraph 4) "believes that it follows from
Biblical teaching that same sex sexual activity
is sinful and that he should do nothing which
endorses such activity". In the course of his
employment he experienced no difficulties of
conscience in counseling same-sex couples
where no sexual issues arose.
 However (while there may have been some
equivocation on his part) at length it became
clear to the employers that he had no
intention of counseling same-sex couples on
sexual matters. On 18 March 2008 he was
dismissed
Conducted & Edited by: Arwa Rinawi, Adv.
 Acts or omissions may obviously have
discriminatory effects – outcomes – as
between one group or class of persons and
another, whether their motivation is for good
or ill; and in various contexts the law allows
indirect discrimination where (in a carefully
controlled legislative setting) it can be shown
to have justifiable effects. Accordingly the
proposition that if conduct is accepted as
discriminatory it thereby falls to be
condemned as disreputable or bigoted is
a non sequitur.
 The promulgation of law for the protection of
a position held purely on religious grounds
cannot therefore be justified. It is irrational, as
preferring the subjective over the objective.
But it is also divisive, capricious and arbitrary.
We do not live in a society where all the
people share uniform religious beliefs. The
precepts of any one religion – any belief
system – cannot, by force of their religious
origins, sound any louder in the general law
than the precepts of any other. If they did,
those out in the cold would be less than
citizens; and our constitution would be on the
way to a theocracy, which is of necessity
autocratic. The law of a theocracy is dictated
without option to the people, not made by
their judges and governments. The individual
conscience is free to accept such dictated
law; but the State, if its people are to be free,
has the burdensome duty of thinking for itself.
 So it is that the law must firmly safeguard the
right to hold and express religious belief;
equally firmly, it must eschew any protection
of such a belief's content in the name only of
its religious credentials. Both principles are
necessary conditions of a free and rational
regime.
 The conferment of any legal protection or
preference upon a particular substantive
moral position on the ground only that it is
espoused by the adherents of a particular
faith, however long its tradition, however rich
its culture, is deeply unprincipled; it imposes
compulsory law not to advance the general
good on objective grounds, but to give effect
to the force of subjective opinion. This must
be so, since, in the eye of everyone save the
believer, religious faith is necessarily
subjective, being incommunicable by any kind
of proof or evidence. It may, of course, be
true, but the ascertainment of such a truth lies
beyond the means by which laws are made in
a reasonable society. Therefore it lies only in
the heart of the believer who is alone bound
by it; no one else is or can be so bound,
unless by his own free choice he accepts its
claims.
http://ww
w.bailii.or
g/ew/cases
/EWCA/C
iv/2010/B
1.html