Withdrawal of secondment offer to protect employee's safety was not disability discrimination
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The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has held that there had been no failure to make reasonable adjustments or discrimination for a reason related to an employee's disability where an employer withdrew a secondment offer following advice that it would risk the employee's safety in Judd v Cabinet Office.
Healix did not agree with the occupational health assessment and explained why their recommendations were insufficient. There was not the same emergency services provision in Montenegro and a language barrier could be problematic. The EAT found that the tribunal was entitled to find that the adjustments proposed were insufficient to protect the claimant's health, safety and wellbeing in Montenegro and that it was a conclusion open to it to reach.
Take note: The decision in Judd shows that, provided that proposed reasonable adjustments can be challenged as insufficient, it will be fine for an employer to decide not to implement them on the basis that a disabled employee will not be adequately protected. It helped here that the claimant herself admitted that she would continue to be at risk if she went to Montenegro and that the Cabinet Office was entitled to act so as to avoid that risk.