Douglas Strang Douglas Strang looks at the case law on religious discrimination in the workplace. Some of the most challenging HR/employment law issues of the recent years have related to religious discrimination and in particular the question of whether an employee can rely on their religious beliefs as justification for refusing to follow a management instruction or otherwise carry out their job. Such issues have been explored in a number of religious discrimination claims, and these claims have generally been unsuccessful. For example, in the leading case of Ladele (2008), a registrar refused to conduct same-sex civil partnerships due to her Christian beliefs about homosexuality. Her discrimination claim failed, as she was dismissed not for her religious beliefs, but for the refusal to carry out a management instruction. That did not give rise, either, to any issue of indirect discrimination, as the employer had a legitimate interest in pursuing a policy of non-discrimination and not allowing any employees to opt-out of particular duties. A number of cases have considered employees who were disciplined or dismissed for “proselytising” or evangelising – sharing their religious beliefs with others. The claimants in the cases of Chandol and Wasteney both failed in their […]
