Free Food Leads to Claim

An employee in Brazil has won a claim against McDonald's on the grounds that the free meals given out whilst he was at work made him fat. McDonald's gave the employee a free meal during each shift, and the employee claims this was the reason behind his 4 stone weight gain during his 12 year career. The employee also claimed that he felt obliged to taste all the food every day to ensure its quality. He won £10,000 in compensation. Needless to say, McDonald's are appealing the decision.

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Costly Sleepwalking

An employee has won a massive payout after his employer issued a defamatory press release about him. He has been awarded £.8.5 million in compensation. The sleepwalker appeared at the hotel bedroom door of a colleague on three occasions whilst on a business trip in Mozambique. His employer took the decision to issue a press release stating that he had been asked to resign following an 'incident'. The court held that the statement implied that he had made inappropriate advances to the colleague when in fact, he had made no attempt to enter the room.

Focus on ...Compensation

Recent tribunal statistics demonstrate the shocking amounts of compensation awarded in discrimination claims. The statistics reveal a 56% increase in accepted claims, obviously a cause for concern for businesses. Interestingly, compensation awards for Disability Discrimination claims are highest, resulting in an average award of £52,087!

Empire HR has drawn up a list of average compensation awards for each type of discrimination:

TYPE OF DISCRIMINATION	AVERAGE AWARD	BIGGEST AWARD
Disability	£52,087	£729,347
Sexual Orientation	£20,384	£163,725
Sex Discrimination	£19,449	£422,366
Race Discrimination	£18,584	£374,922
Age Discrimination	£10,931	£48,710
Religious Discrimination	£4,886	£9,500

When considering these figures it's important to bear in mind that a very high percentage of claims are actually settled before it gets to the tribunal stage. The figures also fail to take into account the legal fees incurred by businesses in defending the claims.