No more English workers... they are all too lazy
How Asian boss racially abused employee
A WORKER has won a discrimination claim after colleagues described English people as lazy and drunk.
James Heeley was one of just a handful of white British staff when he was subjected to ‘hostile and intimidating’ comments, a tribunal heard.
The transport administrator, 28, heard his boss, Gurvinder Birk, say: ‘No more English drivers should be used as they are lazy and only interested in claiming benefits.’
One colleague remarked that the ‘lazy English worker has decided to come back’ when Mr Heeley returned after a few days off sick.
An employment tribunal found he was the victim of racial discrimination and harassment. Mr Birk, 25, was named Young Entrepreneur of the Year in the 2018 Asian Business Awards Midlands. Now his company, Peterboroughbased Birk Holdings Ltd, has been ordered to pay Mr Heeley £2,500 compensation.
The jibes were made by ‘reasonably senior individuals’, the tribunal was told.
Mr Heeley began working at the transport company in October 2017, when just five of its 16 employees were white Britons.
The employment tribunal in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, heard he was the victim of numerous discriminatory comments between February 2018 and February 2019 before he was fired in March 2019.
These included the claim that ‘English drivers do drive slowly’, and Mr Heeley was accused of doing ‘not a lot’ of work because he was English.
Employees Wiktoria Kolenska and Sandra Liutkevciene told him: ‘[We] can tell you’re British as you don’t have your coat on. Are you still drunk from last night?’
Another colleague, Vilius Augustus, said after Mr Heeley returned after being ill: ‘Oh, the lazy English worker has decided to come back to work.’
He also told him: ‘Lazy English workers are always off sick.’
Mr Birk told a senior employee not to hire Britons because they ‘can turn you down easily and claim benefits’.
The company argued that the comments were ‘mere jokes’ and Mr Heeley would ‘join in’.
But the panel, led by employment judge Jennifer Bartlett, noted in its judgment: ‘We do not accept that the fact that he called some of the comments jokes undermines their effect on him.
‘Many extremely unpleasant behaviours can be dressed up as jokes but it is no excuse. Further, we accept that many employees do not wish to raise matters of concern when they are employed due to the fear of suffering adverse consequences.’
Mr Birk sacked Mr Heeley, from Peterborough, citing concerns about performance, attendance and time keeping.
But while the tribunal concluded ‘some issues had been raised with the claimant prior to dismissal’, no evidence was produced of the matters being discussed with Mr Heeley. The company also failed to produce proper HR records.
The panel concluded Mr Heeley had suffered ‘unlawful race discrimination’. It said: ‘We consider that the comments are serious such that they create a hostile and/or intimidating environment because they are made by a number of senior individuals, over a period of time, repeated and in a workplace in which the claimant was a minority.’
It awarded Mr Heeley £2,500 for injury to feelings and £961.74 for a breach of employment law.
Mr Birk was approached for comment but a security guard at the business premises said he was in meetings all day.
‘Are you still drunk from last night?’