A bakery has been ordered to pay £18,500 to a blind man who was sacked during his probationary period. An employment tribunal hearing found that the bakery should have given Ian Stanley more time to familiarise himself with the layout of the factory.
Mr Stanley has been registered blind since 2010. He started work at The Village Bakery in Wrexham in 2023, having spent the 18 years prior working as a waste-coordinator/packer at a different foods manufacturer. He was let go six weeks into his three-month probation period, and an employment tribunal has since found the factory did not do enough to accomodate Mr Stanley and his disability during his employment from July 17, 2023.
According to the company, which employs 170 workers at their Coedpoeth bakery, the dismissal was made out of health and safety concerns. A tribunal hearing held last year heard how colleagues shared with management how Mr Stanley was making mistakes such as crashing racks of bread into machinery, dropping loaves of bread and not cleaning trays efficiently.
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The tribunal found that support should have been offered to Mr Stanley before his dismissal, such as providing him with a support worker, giving a longer probationary period, telling colleagues of the claimant’s disability, and providing him with a high vis jacket/vest. Join our WhatsApp news community here for the latest breaking news. You will receive updates from us daily.
The employers claims that health and safety issues were the main factor in his dismissal was rejected by the tribunal panel as Mr Stanley worked at the factory for six weeks without a health and safety risk assessment taking place. In his judgement, Judge R Brace said: “The Claimant needed more time to learn the layout of the factory – that as this wasn’t something he could see in the same way as others, he was unable to see what work his colleagues were doing to jog his memory and copy, so would need repetition to learn. As a result he took longer to learn by gainingfamiliarity through experience and touch.”
Judge Brace concluded: “In this case, we concluded that the respondent had dismissed the claimant, a disabled employee, without making a reasonable adjustment of giving the claimant more time in conjunction with a support buddy and raising employee awareness of the Claimant’s disability and needs. These adjustments would have in our view enabled the claimant to remain in employment and therefore the dismissal was not justified. We did not consider that dismissal was proportionate and therefore the claim that the dismissal was discriminatory arising from disability is also well founded and succeeds.”
A judgement published on Tuesday, January 14, ordered the factory to pay Mr Stanley a sum total of £18,567.57 to cover loss of earnings and injury to feelings.