The Claimant resigned and made many claims to the ET including harassment and victimisation. All her claims were dismissed by the ET. The Claimant complained of harassment in relation to the way in which a colleague treated her about her accent. She also complained of victimisation relating to the failure of the Respondent to provide her with notes of a meeting which may have helped to resolve her grievance. The ET dismissed both complaints. On the harassment claim the ET said that the references made by the Claimant's colleague to the Claimant’s accent had nothing whatsoever to do with the Claimant’s race in the sense that the motivation (in the sense discussed by Underhill LJ in the paragraphs of his judgment in Unite the Union v Nailard) for making them was in no way or to no extent the Claimant’s race. They were all to do with the Claimant’s intelligibility or comprehensibility when communicating orally. On the victimisation claim, the ET dismissed the claim on the basis that the Respondent would have done the same with any other employee who had indicated an intention to make a claim such as one of constructive dismissal, that did not include a claim of a breach of the EQA. The Claimant appealed.

The EAT allowed the appeal. The ET had erred in law in its analysis of what the term “related to” means in the definition of harassment and in its analysis of a complaint of victimisation.