What equality law means - Birmingham Disability Resource Centre

2. If their complaint is that they have not been offered a job because you found out about
their disability having asked questions which you were not allowed to ask under the rules
against pre-employment health or disability enquiries.
In either of these situations, the burden then shifts onto you to show that you or someone
whose actions or omissions you were responsible for did not discriminate, harass or
victimise the person making the claim.
What the Employment Tribunal can order you to do
If the job applicant wins their case, the tribunal can order what is called a remedy.
The main remedies available to the Employment Tribunal are to:
• Make a declaration that you have discriminated.
• Award compensation to be paid for the financial loss the claimant has suffered (for
example, loss of earnings), and damages for injury to the claimant’s feelings. There is
no legal upper limit on the amount of compensation.
• Make a recommendation, requiring the employer to do something specific within a
certain time to remove or reduce the bad effects which the claim has shown to exist on
the individual.
For example:
Providing a reference or reinstating the person to their job, if the tribunal thinks
this would work despite the previous history.
The Employment Tribunal can also make a recommendation requiring the employer to do
something specific within a certain time to remove or reduce the bad effects which the
claim has shown to exist on the wider workforce (although not in equal pay cases). This
might be particularly applicable where the claimant has already left that employer so any
individual recommendation would be pointless.
For example:
• introducing an equal opportunities policy
• ensuring its harassment policy is more effectively implemented
• setting up a review panel to deal with equal opportunities and
harassment/grievance procedures
• re-training staff, or
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