Ms Rider was a nursery officer at a children's centre. She suffered from severe asthma and a painful and debilitating spinal condition which affected her mobility.
She complained to her employer that her working environment made her condition worse and was seconded to another job where she worked for two years without any difficulty. The Council told her many times that at the end of the secondment she would have to go back to her original job. Ms Rider claimed that that requirement put her at a substantial disadvantage compared with colleagues who didn't have her disability. She was eventually dismissed for capability, never having returned to the original post. She was not offered a different role, nor were reasonable adjustments considered.
Ms Rider's claim hinged on whether the Council had failed in its duty to make reasonable adjustments to enable her to return to work after the secondment ended. For that duty to have arisen, the employer had to have applied a provision, criterion or practice ('PCP') which put her at a substantial disadvantage.
The tribunal held that the employer had not applied a PCP because Ms Rider had not actually gone back to her original job. That decision was overturned on appeal. The Employment Appeal Tribunal held that where an employer tells an employee that they must return to a post, without reasonable adjustments or alternative roles being accounted for, the employer is applying a PCP. If that PCP places the disabled employee at a substantial disadvantage compared with a person who is not disabled, there is a duty to make reasonable adjustments.
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