Discrimination In Panesar V. British Aerospace Plc And Others (1979)

Indirect discrimination

The section 19 of the Equality Act 2010 says that indirect discrimination can be found where a provision, criterion or practice is equally applicable to a group of employees and job candidates however it will influence on people who share a particular protected characteristic at a specific disadvantage when they are compared to others in the same group and it is hard for employers to justify it is discrimination. However, indirect discrimination can also be justified in some circumstances. For example, in Panesar v Nestle’ [1979] IRLR 64, the Court of Appeal said that a principle in the working environment, which did not allow beards and long hair and made Sikhs were excluded, is justified due to hygiene reasons. Even though some group of people were indirectly discriminated, it could be justifiable because it did not prove that the discrimination resulted less favourable treatment on purpose. Another example can be found in Chiu v British Aerospace plc and others [1982] IRLR 56, where Chiu had suffered racial discrimination because of language problems and he insisted that he was asked to do work and complete reports without receiving any help unlike other

This means it must be appropriate and necessary. If there are better and less discriminatory ways of doing things, it will be more difficult to justify discrimination. For example, the fire service asks all job applicants to take some physical tests to assess physical capability. This can be indirect discrimination with age as older people has relatively disadvantage compared to younger people. However, it seems that the fire service has proportional reason for the test to ensure applicants are suitable to do the job and fulfill the proper function. As a result, giving candidates physical test is a proportionate way of achieving legitimate