The claimant, a doctor and Christian, had been employed as a health and disabilities assessor, carrying out assessments of claimants for disability-related benefits. During his induction training, the claimant explained that his beliefs were such that he would not agree to use the preferred pronouns of transgender service users. This conflicted with the respondents’ policies and attempts were made to clarify the claimant’s position to see if his beliefs could be accommodated. Ultimately the claimant left employment and brought discrimination and harassment proceedings in the ET relying on the protected characteristic of religion or belief. The ET accepted that Christianity was a protected characteristic but found the claimant’s particular beliefs did not meet the Grainger criteria and in the alternative that he had not suffered less favourable treatment/harassment.

The President of the EAT, Mrs Justice Eady, while critical of some of the reasoning behind the ET’s analysis of the Grainger criteria, dismissed the appeals as the ET had properly looked at the alternative and found that the claimant had not suffered either direct discrimination - anyone else acting in this way would have been treated then same and he had suffered no penalty - or indirect discrimination.