Pregnancy / Maternity

What is pregnancy and maternity discrimination?

The Equality Act protects women from certain types of discrimination and applies from the beginning of pregnancy until the end of maternity leave. During this period, the law protects female employees or job applicants from discrimination that occurs on the grounds of pregnancy, any illness related to pregnancy (such as nausea), booking maternity leave and changes to her working environment or reduced physical tasks.

 

Discrimination

The Equality Act protects pregnant employees and those on maternity leave against ‘unfavourable’ treatment. This is important, as it means that pregnant employees and those on maternity leave need not prove that they were treated unfairly relative to their colleagues, but only that their employer disadvantaged them in some way because of their pregnancy or maternity leave.

 

Common areas where pregnancy and maternity discrimination occurs:

• Recruitment;
• Pay and terms and conditions of employment;
• Job vacancies and promotion opportunities;
• Training opportunities;
• Managing absence during pregnancy;
• Work performance;
• Dismissal;
• Selection for redundancy; and their
• Return to work.

 

Provision

Employers should consider the physical effects of pregnancy and adjust the workplace accordingly, such as potentially changing roles, workplace environments (fumes, standing for long periods and so on). Making positive changes to adapt is not seen as discriminatory to the expectant mother.

 

What to do if you believe you are being discriminated against due to Pregnancy and/or Maternity

You should initially try to resolve the issue informally by talking to your manager. If a formal internal complaint fails to resolve the matter, you can ask us to step in and mediate on your behalf, ultimately if all else fails you we will assist you in progressing the matter to an Employment Tribunal. You should note however that discrimination claims are often difficult to prove, as employers typically do not leave explicit evidence.

 

How we can help

We would be delighted to act on your behalf to negotiate whether there has, in our experts opinion, been any discrimination made against you or your employment application, To gain our assistance you need to open a case, this is done by taking advantage of our free consultation service, activated by the link at the top of the page, should you wish to start a case the caseworker will send you the suitable payment link.

 

Please note your caseworker can only give generic advice, their role is to prepare your details for handling by our legal team and to act as your point of contact, they will also issue you with your Password and PIN, these will be needed to log onto your client dashboard. From your dashboard you will be able to manage and view every aspect of your case, upload documents, images, files etc.

 

Your legal team will carefully examine the employers policies/procedures on the matter and if there is an identified issue, we would seek to assist you in bringing about a fair solution by mediating between yourself and your employer. If a solution cannot be found then we would support you in lodging a claim via an employment tribunal. You should be conscious of the strict time constraints as discrimination claims must be brought to an Employment Tribunal within three months of the alleged discriminatory act. We do tend to find that employers tend to be significantly more responsive when you have taken steps to obtain professional legal advice.