A civil servant scared of catching viruses has won the first stage of an employment tribunal case over his bosses' refusal to let him work from home. John-Paul Pryce, who worked as a case officer dealing with debt and bankruptcy, was allowed to work from home during the pandemic. As a child he was frightened of germs, viruses and illnesses and those fears continued into adulthood.
And he never sought therapy?
But with the emergence of Covid-19, and him contracting the virus in March 2020, he became fearful in the presence of others and would suffer panic attacks if people were close by. Mr Pryce said he saw them as 'coughing, sneezing germ and virus spreaders'.
Well, given that's exactly how the government of the day was describing them at the time, that's understandable. Of course, they were wrong then, so he's wrong to still believe it.
In 2022, he was asked to return to the office, and his flexible working request emphasising the benefits of home-working because of his embarrassment in admitting to his phobia was rejected.But now he has won the first stage of an employment tribunal fight, with a judge in Glasgow ruling his symptoms should be classed as a disability under equality laws.
And the term 'disability' is stretched even more beyond recognition.
The easiest course of action is probably just to sack him and deal with the consequences of that, rather than have to compensate him after a tribunal and still keep him on
ReplyDeleteI asume a large part of his fear is that if he actually goes to the office the others will see how little he contributes and his boss might let him go.
ReplyDeleteI grew up around farms. The adults around us seemed to have a very cavalier attitude towards muck and germs. Non of us seemed to get ill that much as I recall. Regarding the whole Covid business, I believe that, once it had become endemic, no amount of quarantining, distancing, masking or handwashing would make the slightest difference. In this case, getting being a stupid twat classified as a disability is just a great way to game the system.
ReplyDeleteStonyground.
"The easiest course of action is probably just to sack him and deal with the consequences of that..."
ReplyDeleteI do wonder if a cost-analysis would come out in favour of that.
"I asume a large part of his fear is that if he actually goes to the office the others will see how little he contributes..."
Well, maybe. But they do say if you want to hide a tree, do it in a forest 😏
"I grew up around farms. The adults around us seemed to have a very cavalier attitude towards muck and germs. "
The huge variety of antibiotic sprays around now were unknown when I was growing up...😉