I think the photographer had a thing for winsomely propped up chins. You had one go at it. ONE go. He'd bellow: 'SMILE!'
SAFE IN SUNNY PORTSMOUTH Yes. Really.
PICTURE PAST IMPERFECT The days before Instagram...
WAIT A MINUTE, MR POSTMAN The EAT backs a rejected Royal Mail applicant
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Wg Employment Issue 572/October 2017 Worried about crime and danger? Better move to Portsmouth then. I have to confess that here in WG Towers, we have occasionally indulged in a little bit of Pompey poking because our colleagues have an office in Dicken's home city. They, in return, do a commensurate amount of Scummers baiting, which we in Southampton loftily ignore. Mostly. Those at Fareham HQ simply glance from east to west and back again, sigh, and ask us all to play nicely. But where would Portsmouth be without Southampton to bash? And what would Southampton be without Portsmouth to disdain? The rivalry makes us who we are and nobody can take that away from us! Nevertheless, it's time for the Pompey end to claim the bragging rights. Not for the footie (hur-hur) but for the safety. Yes. You read it right. Safety. Survey results on Yahoo! this week reveal the UK's most dangerous and most safe cities... MOST DANGEROUS: 1. North West London 2. Central London 3. South West London 4. South East London 5. Leeds
SAFEST: 1. Belfast 2. West London 3. Portsmouth 4. Newcastle 5. Plymouth
It's online so it must be true. Pompey? Aaaaw. They're poppets!
No post for the postie! And speaking of unassailable posts brings me to the rather sad and slightly worrying case of Efobi v Royal Mail Group Ltd... Mr Efobi, a black African born in Nigeria, worked as a postman for Royal Mail. He hoped to secure a role in IT and submitted approximately 33 job applications for internal IT roles but was unsuccessful. Royal Mail job applications have to be made online and at the time external applicants were asked to provide details of their town and country of birth. Mr Efobi voluntarily provided information on the application forms about his town and country of birth and therefore believed he was unsuccessful due to his race and brought a claim for direct race discrimination to the Employment Tribunal. To fill a vacancy, the hiring manager would provide a job brief to a recruiter who would advertise the vacancy, sift through the applications and produce a list of possible candidates. The recruiter would then reduce this to a shortlist after discussing the manager’s requirement for the role with them. Shortlisted candidates were interviewed and required to take a test know as “talent Q”, made up of psychometric, skills and ability tests. Mr Efobi uploaded a generic CV for each of the applications, although he did not need to do so as an internal applicant. The Tribunal found that Mr Efobi’s CV did not provide context and was not specifically tailored to any of the roles he applied for, and stated that Mr Efobi had no evidence of the race of the successful candidates, or those longlisted or shortlisted.
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They could therefore not make any findings as to whether they were appropriate comparators for the purposes of Mr Efobi’s direct discrimination claim. Mr Efobi had also not proved that Royal Mail’s recruiters or hiring managers knew of his protected characteristic, or that this influenced the decisions not to shortlist, longlist, interview or appoint him for any jobs he applied for. The Tribunal concluded that Mr Efobi had failed to discharge the initial burden of proof. Mr Efobi appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal which overturned the decision. The EAT was critical of Royal Mail’s failure to call any of the decision-makers to give evidence or to present evidence of the race or national origin of the successful candidates. Royal Mail had instead opted to “cut to the chase” and only present evidence of its reasons for rejecting Mr Efobi’s applications. As no direct evidence of the reasoning of the decision-makers was considered, the Tribunal had been forced to rely on second-hand evidence. The impact of the decision will therefore be far-reaching as it changes the long established burden of proof principles set out in previous cases of Barton and Igen. It seems surprising that the significance in the change of wording in section 136 of the Equality Act 2010 has not been picked up on by the tribunals or court before this case. The case is also a reminder for respondents of the importance of calling at least one decision-maker as a witness.
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WG World: Picture this And speaking of one decision maker puts me in mind of a way too powerful visitor to our schools way back in the 20th century... As we all posed last week for the brand new Employment Team photo (think LA Law but with more raw sex appeal) I had a traumatic flashback. The school photo. *shiver* You'd arrive that morning in spotless uniform and with your hair so viciously brushed you had to keep your fringe plastered down with lick to hide the grazes on your forehead. You'd line up and then go in and sit on the photographer's chair... or maybe kneel down and rest your elbows on a little shelf draped with brown velour, while propping up your chin, winsomely, on your steepled hands. I remember that year. I think the photographer had a thing for winsomely propped up chins. You had one go at it. ONE go. He'd bellow: 'SMILE!' and then blind you with his flashbulb. A week later all the mugshots would be sent home and your mum would tell you how lovely you looked. You didn't. You looked like a startled rabbit about to get hit by a truck. Didn't make any difference. Photos cost a lot back then so it HAD to go in a little cardboard frame on the mantelpiece. It HAD to... Today's kids are born to pose. And then there's Instagram. They don't know how lucky they are. Will you share a school photo? If you are willing to post one over on our Facebook page, I will post one of mine. Probably.
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