I'm guessing I'm not alone in finding myself dealing with disability discrimination in relation to work with RA, and facing the risk of losing a valued and much-loved career path.
I really need some help. My situation is a bit specific because when I developed RA I was in the process of a career change, to become a mental health practitioner. I was completing a training programme jointly provided by an NHS trust which provides clinical experience and a university, which runs and accredits the formal qualification. In my case it's the university that's mishandled my medical situation - where I'm classed as a student despite being employed by the health service. This limits my access to formal support (like a union), procedure (there's no tribunal) and advice, and means - as I understand it - the relevant legal area of practice is education law rather than employment law. From what I know so far (which is very little, to be honest), that is quite a specialist area.
I've exhausted all of the obvious approaches to addressing the situation - extensive attempts at informal resolution, internal complaints processes (the university has acknowledged discriminating against me which is a start and suggests I'd have a good case, but that was in a very limited way and has not resulted in any action being taken to address it), student union, insurance policies, law clinics, third sector organisations, EASS. Union representation isn't an option because the issue lies with the university as training provider. So the only remaining route I can think of is taking civil legal action, which is an absolute last report for me and a financial as well as practical strain.
Can anyone offer any advice, experiences or pointers, please? Have you needed to challenge disability discrimination through legal process? Could you recommend any education lawyers through personal experience or word of mouth? Can you enlighten me at all on the law in this area and how to navigate a process like this? Anything! I've never needed to do anything like this before, and although I've tried to inform myself it is hard to get my head round it all and most of the information and support you can access is generic, not tailored to your specific situation. I've no idea even how to assess and select an appropriate solicitor.
Any help or advice would be extremely welcome. Thank you.
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virtualreality
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Is there anything specific that you can explain that is affecting you day to day now…or is it about your working future ?Have you asked the NHS trust you mentioned if other people have come up against similar problems?
It started as 'failure to make reasonable adjustments' when I was still really quite unwell, adjustments that I had verbally been told would be made by the relevant member of staff, and that were feasible and permissible within the training regulations. There is no reason I know why they weren't followed through - it's never been explained. But that started a fairly complicated cascade of events that had a seriously detrimental effect on my training process and health, and involved significant (and blatant) misrepresentation of key information by the staff involved. Medical documentation and university procedures for dealing with the same have been literally ignored. So the situation quickly became one of harassment as well as discrimination, which is unpleasant and, I would say, hostile. Formal processes have been used to close down rather than address the problems, the well-known 'closing of ranks' phenomenon. Some of the issues were recognised at the final stage of the internal complaints process though, which offers some hope, but not all of them - and nothing in any case has been done to address them. The staff responsible for the original problems have not even acknowledged the university's own conclusion that I've been discriminated against, so there is an issue of denial and intransigence as well. All of these problems need to be addressed before I can continue my training, and they have delayed completion of my training by two years and counting already, so there are significant ongoing professional and practical impacts of the situation for me.
I hope that answers your question and makes sense! It has become a very complicated situation because it's been going on for so long, so I find it quite hard to explain it succinctly.
Oh, I meant to answer the second part of your question too: yes there are others affected by the university's handling of disability round the training process, but generally people leave the training because of it, probably - understandably - because the formal processes are intimidating and exhausting to navigate (and ears are not really open to hearing about these kinds of problems, it seems). Not many people take the process as far as I have, but I love my job and don't want to lose it.
I have no idea about the discrimination laws as it never happened to me, my Local Authority was great and really I never had any real issues anyway. But due to another issue do have one suggestion. If you drive does your car insurance include free legal advice? If so then contact the insurer and ask for help. You must have the insurance for the year the problem first occurred. I used this for getting advice about a medically induced injury. It might not work for in your case, but it’s just a phone call to ask.
Hi, thanks so much for this suggestion! I don't have a car but did try my home insurance and because it's education rather than employment law it's not covered, sadly. I'm very glad to hear you never had to deal with this in your career.
I am guessing you have approached the NHS Trust that is involved? You are presumably salaried? Does that .trust pay you? If so it should be able to help…..as you are not getting the educational benefits you are entitled to. …that indirectly they are paying for
I have no experience of anything like this….& I may be in Cloud Cuckoo land, but if that is the case….it may have something to do with the University’ s failure to comply with disability regulations for students in general & your case in particular?
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