A hospital did not directly discriminate on grounds of age by subjecting a project assistant manager over the age of 55 to a performance-management process, which resulted in the termination of her employment.
Facts
Mrs West was employed by Great Ormond Street Hospital (“GOSH”) as a project assistant manager from July 2014 in the Cardiac Booking Office, which is the major referral centre for children with complicated heart and lung conditions. Her role was to book patients in for surgery slots as soon as she had attended a conference to determine the order of priority for patients. It was imperative that there was no delay in booking a patient in for surgery, as this could have serious consequences.
Mrs West’s line manager, Ms Rait, believed that there was a backlog with booking patients in for surgery, so met with Mrs West in May 2016 for a performance management process. She was awarded a “good” rating during that review, but booking ratings subsequently continued to be low.
Mrs West contended that in June 2016, during a meeting that Ms Rait had with an admissions coordinator, she had asked the coordinator whether Mrs West was planning on retiring at 60. Ms Rait also allegedly said in meetings in February and May 2017 that Mrs West had a “mental block” and told her: “you don’t want to develop”. Mrs West also alleged that another colleague had been managed out of the organisation previously because of his age.
In October 2016, Mrs West was temporarily removed from her role after two patients needing urgent surgery missed their surgery booking slots. After a series of review meetings and hearings over the course of 2016 and 2017, she was finally dismissed by letter in August 2017. She alleged that the decision to dismiss her, and GOSH’s decision to launch a process to investigate her performance, amounted to direct age discrimination.
Decision
Mrs West relied on being in the over-55 age group, and on Ms Rait’s conduct towards her in the meetings held prior to her dismissal to prove that GOSH had a discriminatory motive for her terminating her employment.
The Employment Tribunal (“ET”) found on the evidence that Ms Rait did ask whether Mrs West had plans to retire. However, it also found that there were genuine performance management concerns – Mrs West was not meeting her objectives and there was no evidence that Ms Rait treated her differently to any other employee. Ms Rait had also suggested training, but Mrs West refused on the basis that matters out of her control were leading her to underperform, rather than her grasp of the booking system. The ET concluded that there was no evidence of less favourable treatment of Mrs West, and no evidence of age discrimination in the conduct of the process.
In terms of the actual decision to dismiss her, the ET found that there could be no age discrimination because Mrs West did not contend that the individual who made the decision (a person other than Ms Rait) did so by reason of age. The ET accordingly rejected the claim.
The judgment is available here
Mrs A West v Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust 2200051/2018