Brighton & Hove Pride 2016
Martin Searle Solicitors is proud to support Brighton and Hove Pride 2016. Our ‘Fighting for LGBT Rights in the Workplace’ banner hangs from our top balcony at 9 Marlborough Place, in solidarity with our LBGTQ+ colleagues and neighbours.
The ‘pink pound’ makes a huge contribution to Brighton and Hove’s economy and it’s great to live in a city that’s ‘Glad to be Gay’.
Our firm are renowned for our equality work and the majority of our work is fighting pregnancy and maternity or disability discrimination. We have found that sexual orientation discrimination is less common and we hope that this is because Brighton and Hove is so LBGTQ+ friendly.
However, some of the cases we’ve acted on, where employees have been unfairly treated at work due to their sexual orientation, include:
A young man called ‘Gay Boy 1’ by his boss – an expensive choice of words as my client was awarded £30,000 by the Employment Tribunal for Sexual Orientation Harassment.
A woman, verbally abused by her employer who had missed out on a well-deserved promotion. We helped her successfully claim compensation for sex discrimination and sexual orientation discrimination.
A transgender woman who, having spurned her boss’s sexual advances was dismissed when he found out she was transgender.
Many people do not realise that perceived sexual orientation can also result in discrimination. The well-known case of English v Thomas Sanderson [2008] involved harassment of a heterosexual man, who was perceived to be gay, because he had attended a boarding school and lived in Brighton!
Pride definitely celebrates diversity in the workplace, with LBGTQ+ workers from our hospitals, schools, public services, trade unions and many other professions marching with their ‘straight’ colleagues, in a heartening display of unity.
We look forward to celebrating with everyone tomorrow.
