A quick question on potential discrimination against pregnant employees regarding set dates of annual leave and maternity leave. A company gives all employees 25 days holiday but sets out in a manual that is appended to each employee’s employment contract that three days of this must be taken on set dates over the Christmas period. An employee goes on maternity leave towards the end of the year and uses her last three days annual leave that year, with her manager’s sign off, on days other than on the set dates. These set dates then fall in her maternity leave period. Can the company claim those three days annual leave back on the basis that they weren’t taken as annual leave in accordance with the manual or is this discrimination on the basis of pregnancy (as the employee would have taken them as holiday on the set dates stated in the manual but for the fact that she was on maternity leave)?
Will Cummins