An NHS hospital cleaner who was sacked from her job after taking 400 sick days in just four years has won nearly £50,000 in compensation.
Zoe Kitching struggled with ‘complex mental health issues’ and took various periods of sick leave between 2019 and 2023.
Despite a huge amount of evidence indicating her health problems, service managers failed to acknowledge this and she was sacked due to her absences from work. An employment judge claimed they were ‘particularly surprised’ that one NHS boss deemed her able ahead of her unfair dismissal, reports the Mail Online.
The tribunal ruled it was ‘irrational and wrong’ to deny Kitching of her disability status and that she should have been offered more sick leave. Kitching, who was employed as a cleaner at Royal Lancaster Infirmary, successfully sued the trust that runs the site, University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust.
Kitching – who represented herself at the hearing in Manchester – won claims of disability discrimination and unfair dismissal. She has now been awarded £49,147 in compensation.
She suffered with depression, anxiety and was bipolar, it was revealed. Her issues were deemed ‘complex’.
Hospital records show that from 2019 until June 2023, when she was let go that she had been off for a total of 406 days.
Of the 406 days, 85 per cent directly related to her disability and 12 per cent were due to non-disability related reasons, such as Covid-19 or general cold and flu.
Despite previously being classified as disabled, in January 2021, the hospital received an occupational health report which ‘curiously’ stated that she was ‘not a disabled person within the meaning of the Equality Act 2010’, the tribunal found.
Over the next few months, Mrs Bradburn – Patient Environment Site Services Manager – held meetings with Kitching about her absences. Mrs Bradburn set her targets to reduce the number of days she had off.
By June 2023, her absences had improved, but she was sacked by David Passant, Divisional Manager of Facilities.
Christopher Brisley, People & OD Business Partner, informed Passant that Kitching was not disabled. It was heard that the NHS managers simply took the January 2021 Occupational Health report into account and ignored other obvious evidence that Ms Kitching was disabled.
Kitching claimed her ‘mental health disability had been ignored’. The tribunal judgement said: “[Ms Kitching] was extremely upset by the decision to dismiss her and the refusal of Mr Passant to recognise that [she] was a disabled person as defined under the Equality Act 2010.
“[Ms Kitching] asked for another chance and explained that her absences had been due to mental health. [She] said it was unnecessary for her to lose her job. [Ms Kitching] was extremely upset after the decision was taken at appeal not to overturn the original decision to dismiss. We’ve accepted [her] evidence that she felt that she had been dismissed twice.”
Employment Judge Robert Childe slammed the managers, stating that “at no point… did Ruth Bradburn form the view that [Ms Kitching] had a disability” and that “Mr Passant did not agree that she had a disability”.
Judge Childe said: “We find the [NHS trust] should have permitted a high level of sickness absence overall from [Ms Kitching] and the failure to do so was a failure to make adjustments. We find that the [NHS trust] did not act reasonably in treating that as a sufficient reason for dismissing [Ms Kitching] in the circumstances.
“At no time during the dismissal meeting or appeal meeting did the [NHS trust] agree that [Ms Kitching] was a disabled person… which led to an unfair and fundamentally flawed and discriminatory decision to dismiss [her]. There was a wealth of medical evidence available… that [Ms Kitching] was a disabled person. We were particularly surprised that Christopher Brisley advised Mr Passant, that [Ms Kitching] was not a disabled person. The decision to deny that [Ms Kitching] was disabled was irrational and wrong, given the medical evidence available to the contrary.”
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