Senior Housing Trust Managers awarded £95k compensation for race discrimination

David Stephenson successfully represented Ms Natalie James and Ms Joanna Saine in their claims for race discrimination against London & Quadrant Housing Trust  (L&Q), when they were overlooked for promotion.

Ms James and Ms Saine worked for L&Q as Regional Rehousing/Lettings Managers. Both had considerable leadership experience (10 and 7 years), an essential requirement of the three new Homeownership roles established in February 2022 following a restructuring within the Development and Sales directorate.

There were six internal candidates, three white and three black (and/or black/white mixed). Both successful candidates were white, and Ms Purbrick (Hiring Manager) decided to re-advertise the third vacancy to external candidates even though the three black candidates “were not, not appointable”. 

In upholding their complaints of race discrimination, the Employment Tribunal found that Miss Purbrick did not record all of the information provided by Ms James and Saine during their interviews and that Miss Page (HR Recruitment Advisor) “deferred to Miss Purbrick” due to her “better technical knowledge” and “other requirements for the role”.

The ET rejected L&Q’s evidence that Miss Purbrick and Miss Page independently scored the candidates with identical scores across each question. The ET found that Miss Purbrick’s view of the three black candidates’ suitability for appointment was based on her subjective view of who she thought would “fit in”, who she was “100% sure of”, and with whom she was “100% comfortable.” In other words, Miss Purbrick was the sole decision-maker, did not take adequate notes and based her decision on her subjective view of the three black candidates.

The ET were satisfied that this subjective layer of decision making was sufficient to establish a prima facie case of discrimination, stating “basing recruitment decisions on subjective views, or gut feelings, increases the risk of stereotypes and unconscious bias coming into play”. And because of the “inexplicable inconsistency in [the] approach to the claimants”, L&Q did not prove that this was in no sense whatsoever to do with race. The ET awarded Ms James and Ms Saine £64k and just under £31k respectively (including £20k each for injury to feelings) to represent their loss of a chance of promotion. 

Baroness Kishwer Falkner, Chairwoman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said: “No one should be denied career progression because of their race. Employers have a responsibility to ensure their interview processes are fair and that they have systems in place to prevent discrimination from occurring. Poor recruitment practices at L&Q meant that the organisation lost decades of experience from their workforce, and their handling of the situation has negatively impacted Natalie and Joanna’s health and future careers. 

As Britain’s equality watchdog, we will continue to use our unique powers to uphold the law and prevent discrimination in the workplace.”

David Stephenson of Doughty Street Chambers represented Ms Natalie James and Joanna Saine instructed by Pritti Bajaria, Workwise Legal LLP. 

The liability and remedy Judgments can be found here and here. 

Media coverage: https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/tribunal-finds-unconscious-bias-in-how-london-landlord-handled-recruitment-process-85862