Cairns v Royal Mail Group

Cairns v Royal Mail Group [2024] EAT 129

Facts

Che claimant was working as a postal delivery person and was responsible for performing outdoor responsibilities. He was unable to continue working outside due to a knee injury and osteoarthritis, both of which are considered disabilities. It was for a length of time that he shifted into a supernumerary indoor duty. A consultation was initiated by the Respondent in order to terminate his employment on the basis of ill-health retirement. As a result, he was unable to continue working outside. There were no additional vacant indoor positions available at that moment. It was decided to dismiss the claimant.

He asserted that he was fired unfairly. In addition, he asserted that the failure to wait for the forthcoming merging of the Claimant's postal centre with another centre, which would have resulted in the creation of indoor roles, was an example of discrimination based on a disability and a failure to make reasonable adaptations. Any and all claims were rejected by the employment tribunal, which came to the conclusion that there is a point in time when a surplus job must be terminated.

Held

The claimant filed an appeal against the decision alleging discrimination. An appeal was granted by the Employment Appeal Tribunal, which stated that the tribunal had placed an excessive amount of emphasis on the circumstances that existed at the time of the dismissal. In doing so, it had failed to take into consideration a crucial aspect of the Claimant's case, which was that the Respondent ought to have kept him in employment at the time of his appeal so that he may be allocated to an indoor role, on the occasion of the merging of the two postal offices.

It was the claimant's contention that it would have been a reasonable adjustment to retain him in work for this brief period of time. An additional argument that he made was that his inability to work outdoors arose from his disability.  He was dismissed for this reason, which was discriminatory decision-making. Given that there were plans to create new indoor roles, it was also unjustifiable.

Comment

The tribunal made a mistake when it did not take into consideration whether or not it was a reasonable adjustment to delay the termination of the disabled employee until the merger was finished. An inability to perform work duties due to a disbaility cannot be a valid grounds for termination in situations where the employer has other options available to them. This particular case serves as a good illustration of this principle.