Discrimination Questionnaires

The EAT has, this morning, handed down the important decision of D'Silva v NATFHE. It reminds practitioners that a failure by an employer to respond to a discrimination questionnaire (or an equivocal / evasive response) does not - without more - automatically raise a presumption of discrimination.

Underhill J states that there will often be good reasons why questionnaires have not been answered (or documents not disclosed), or that the failure will have no bearing on whether an act of discrimination took place. In such cases, "time and money should not be spent pursuing the point" (para. 38).