The claimant was a care worker in a residential childrens’ home whose employment contract required her to work on Sundays. Requiring workers to work on Sundays indirectly discriminates against Christians who want to keep Sunday work-free, so it must be justified by the employer as a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.

This care home looked after children with complex needs, so continuity of care was important. At any time, there needed to be both male and female experienced staff on duty. Rotas were drawn up and the employer told the claimant it could not promise she would never work a Sunday but that it would do its best. The practice had both financial and other costs for the employer. Agency staff were more expensive and other staff lost out on the ability to take Sundays off, or to take a whole week’s leave. The EAT said that rostering the claimant to work on Sundays was not unlawful indirect discrimination since the employer had taken proportionate steps to achieve a legitimate aim.

Mba v the Mayor of Burgess (UKEAT/0332/12/SM)

The claimant was a G4S security guard. For some time he had regularly travelled on Friday lunchtimes to a nearby mosque for prayers. In 2008, he was told his lunchtime visits to the mosque were no longer possible because the contract with G4S’s client demanded a certain number of guards on the premises during contract hours and non-compliance could trigger penalties and the loss of the contract.

G4S provided an on-site prayer room. They also offered to vary the claimant’s working hours so that he did not work on Fridays. This was not acceptable and the dispute continued until G4S told him formally that the arrangement could not continue. The claimant claimed indirect religious discrimination.

G4S was unable to vary the contract with its own client to allow the claimant to leave site for Friday prayers or to ask permission for him to leave. Security guards had to work shifts of at least eight hours for the business to be financially sound. Neither was it practical to engage cover for lunchtime absences, especially since security work was inherently reactive and unpredictable, as disturbances in the public area could happen at any time. The EAT concluded that the practice of preventing the claimant leaving the site on Friday lunchtimes was indirectly discriminatory but that it was a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.

Mr N Cherfi v G4S Security Services Limited UKEAT/03/0379/10DM