Vegan wins £13k after boss at sandwich shop waved meat in her face

A VEGAN worker at a Scots Subway branch has won a payout of almost £13,000 after her boss waved meat in her face and urged her to eat food to which she was allergic.

Himanshu Lahar said to Kady Reilly ‘go on, eat it, what could happen?’, telling her to ‘eat like a man, walk like a bull’, an employment tribunal heard.

He would make disparaging comments about her and when she refused to eat food she was allergic to, he said ‘Nasa should send you back to Mars’, the panel heard.

The tribunal was told the mother of two made various complaints about the operation of the fast-food franchise in Glasgow.

These included that Mr Lahar had served vegan customers dairy cheese when it ran out of a plant-based alternative.

But when RT Management Bridgeton, which owned the franchise, did not listen, Miss Reilly reported it to environmental health officials and was sacked shortly after a council investigation. She is to receive £12,636 after the tribunal found she was fired for her disclosures, which were protected under whistleblowing rules.

It was said her boss’s comments went against the Equality Act as her veganism constitutes a philosophical belief.

Miss Reilly began working at the Subway in the city’s Bridgeton in August 2020. The tribunal heard she told Mr Lahar about her veganism after which he made jokes and encouraged her to handle and eat meat.

‘She described being “shocked” at her boss’s flippant attitude to allergies and the possible consequences of a person consuming a substance which they had a severe allergic reaction to,’ the panel heard. In October 2020, she was sacked and told she hadn’t passed her probation period.

Miss Reilly took RT Management Bridgeton to the tribunal claiming unfair dismissal, harassment, unauthorised deductions from wages and that she had not had uninterrupted rest breaks.

She won each claim, with the tribunal ruling Mr Lamar had harassed her and that she was sacked for making the protected disclosures.

Employment judge Claire McManus concluded: ‘We were satisfied that for [Miss Reilly], veganism is a philosophical belief within the meaning of Section 10 of the Equality Act 2010 and is a protected characteristic for her.’