A worker who was asked by her boss to attend a meeting because a client liked ‘pretty women’ has won a claim for sex discrimination.
Emma Nunn worked at vehicle recovery company G and MJ Crouch and Son, also known as Crouch Recovery. She filed tribunal claims for sexual harassment, sex discrimination, harassment relating to sex and unfair dismissal.
The tribunal in 2023 heard that her manager Adam Crouch sent a message on WhatsApp explaining that a client would be attending a meeting and she should join as “he likes pretty women”.
She responded that she should be in the meeting because she looked after the customer in question, adding “I am not coming if just for pretty face”.
Sex discrimination
Crouch sent the response “calm down Royder! OK babes” – with ‘Royder’ referring to an occasion where he had described her to a customer as Emma Royd (a play on the word haemorrhoid), leading the client to send her an email addressing her as such.
Details of the claim that have now just been released include a range of other incidents where Nunn believed she had been treated differently because of her sex or had felt harassed. One such case was an alleged promise of a new Ford Ranger company car that never materialised, which she claims was an act of direct discrimination.
She also claimed that when she resigned, Crouch “pressured me into believing I would be protected, loved, supported and recompensed for my years of loyalty and contribution”.
Judge Rachel Broughton dismissed all of Nunn’s claims apart from that of sex discrimination, finding that the “pretty woman” comment would not have been made to a man.
“Mr Adam Crouch was not being affectionate, he was being sarcastic and teasing her when she was clearly upset by his comment,” she said in judgment.
“It was not flattering the claimant, it was reducing her value to the business in that context, and what she would contribute to the meeting.”
The tribunal ruled male employees would not have had the same comments made to them, or had their physical attractiveness given as a reason to attend a meeting.
A hearing to decide the amount of compensation to be awarded to Nunn will take place at a future date.
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