Supporting Brexit is not a belief that is protected from workplace discrimination, an employment tribunal has ruled, as a former Ukip councillor lost her claim that she was bullied and harassed by her charity employer because she supported the UK’s departure from the EU. Colette Fairbanks was sacked from her job at the drug and alcohol rehabilitation charity Change Grow Live after sharing “offensive” posts about immigrants on social media, a tribunal hearing was told. Fairbanks argued that her political views were philosophical beliefs protected by the Equality Act. These included a belief the UK should be outside of the EU, an opposition to illegal migration and being happy to leave the European convention on human rights.
However the tribunal found that these were not beliefs protected by the Equality Act. Wanting to leave the EU was an opinion rather than a philosophical belief that fell under equality laws, the employment judge Paul Jumble said. Dismissing Fairbanks’ claim, Jumble said: “There has to be a distinction between a philosophical belief and a strongly held opinion. If, for example, ‘wanting to leave the EU’ was held to be a philosophical belief, then more than half the British electorate would have a belief that fell within [equality laws], which could not be the intention of the legislation. “Despite some probing, both by the tribunal and in cross-examination, no coherent belief or set of beliefs was forthcoming. On balance, the tribunal found that the claimant had genuinely held opinions and views but she did not convince the tribunal that she had any underlying philosophical belief.” The hearing in Manchester was told Fairbanks started working for Change Grow Live as a recovery worker on 10 October 2022. She was a councillor in Wyre, Lancashire, for Ukip between about 2017 and 2019, and a colleague told her manager about this in February 2023, the tribunal heard. Fairbanks claimed she was “bullied and harassed” thereafter. She was sacked from the job, based in Fleetwood, Lancashire, in July 2023 because of offensive posts she shared on X, though she denied that one of the accounts they came from belonged to her. Employment tribunal decisions are not binding legal precedents but they can help shape the law.