Differences in treatment cannot flow from discriminatory acts

In re Equal Opportunities Commission for Northern Ireland's application (20.9.88) EOR23B, the Northern Ireland High Court grants a declaration that the Department of Education and the Education Boards unlawfully discriminated on grounds of sex by not offering non-fee-paying places in grammar schools to girls who had scored as high as boys on an 11-plus exam, even though the boys were permitted to retain their places on grounds of fairness because they had already been notified of the award. The Court rules that as the places had been awarded to the boys in the first place as a result of a discriminatory system of examination marking, the boys' more favourable treatment flowed directly from acts of unlawful discrimination.