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Equal pay: Challenge to SMP exclusion fails

This report relates to 1 case(s)

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    Banks v Tesco Stores Ltd [1999] ICR 1141 IT (1 other report)

    • SMP not indirectly discriminatory

      Date:
      1 March 1998

      The rules on statutory maternity pay (SMP) which deny payment to women whose earnings are below the lower earnings limit cannot be held to be indirectly discriminatory on grounds of sex, an Ashford industrial tribunal (Chair: D E de Saxe) has held in Banks v (1) Tesco Stores Ltd and (2) Secretary of State for Social Security.

In Banks v (1) Tesco Stores Ltd (2) Secretary of State for Social Security 4.6.97 case no. 18985/95, an industrial tribunal holds that the contract of a part-time employee, who was not eligible for SMP because her earnings were less than the lower earnings limit for payment of national insurance contributions, was less favourable in respect of parental leave than that of a male comparator who was unconditionally entitled to three days' paid parental leave.