Age Discrimination Case not a Panacea

There have been a substantial number of interesting cases coming through the employment tribunals and courts over the last three months which will have a profound impact on how employers deal with age discrimination and disability discrimination cases. 

Th Court of Appeal has now upheld an employment tribunal's decision that the dismissal of a senior employee to avoid enhanced pension entitlement did not suffer unlawful age discrimination.  Essentially the Court accepted that an employer could not justify treatment solely around the issue of increased costs, but, on the "unusual facts" of the the case, the chief executive's dismissal could not be characterised as having been solely aimed at having the objective of saving or avoiding costs.  Rather the dismissal had been a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim of effecting the chief executive's redundancy and was therefore justified.

This case (Woodcock v. Cumbria Primary Care Trust [2012]) has been headlined as a purely costs-saving exercise but clearly each case must be examined on its particular facts.  Therefore, this case does not give employers the certainty that they would believe by the headlines in the press.