Odhams Walk Residents' Management Ltd v Westminster City Council

The statutory prohibitions on sex discrimination require a direct legal relationship between the alleged discriminator and the person said to be treated less favourably or subjected to a discriminatory condition. An agency relationship limited to property management does not make a council the employer or landlord of an organisation’s staff. A policy addressed to housing management organisations therefore does not, without more, constitute discrimination in the organisations’ employment or housing arrangements. A challenge under the gender equality duty also requires evidence identifying how the public authority failed to have due regard to the statutory duty in the relevant circumstances.

The claimant managed council-owned properties under an agreement appointing it as the Council’s agent for specified housing management functions. The Council adopted a policy that only studio-sized accommodation would be made available to housing management organisations for residential staff. The claimant argued that the policy indirectly discriminated against women, married persons and civil partners under the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, and breached the Council’s gender equality duty under section 76A. It relied on the effect of the policy on staff with families and on the Council’s relationship with the claimant.

Other grounds, including irrationality, irrelevant considerations and inadequate consultation, had been rejected at the permission stage. The central issues were whether the Council’s legal relationship with the claimant and its employees engaged Parts II and III of the Act, and whether the claimant had demonstrated a failure to comply with section 76A.

1. Claim dismissed. The Council’s policy was not unlawful on the grounds advanced.
2. The management agreement made the claimant the Council’s agent only for the management of the properties. It did not make the Council the employer of the claimant’s staff or their landlord. The claimant independently determined its employees’ remuneration and other employment terms, and the Council did not choose whom the claimant could employ or license.
3. The statutory language of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 presupposed a direct relationship in which one person treated another less favourably or applied a provision, criterion or practice adversely affecting that person. The policy was directed to housing management organisations and did not determine how the claimant treated its employees.
4. Sections 6 and 30 were not engaged. Section 6 concerned employment by the discriminator, while section 30 concerned the offering, management or occupation of premises by the discriminator. The Council’s policy concerned the accommodation it would offer to organisations for their prospective employees. It did not concern the Council’s recruitment, employment or provision of accommodation to those individuals.
5. Centrum voor gelijkheid van kansen en voor racismebestrijding v Firma Feryn NV (Case C-54/07) did not assist. That case concerned discriminatory recruitment statements by an employer directly engaged in recruiting employees. The Council was not the employer and had made no statement about whom the claimant should employ.
6. The section 76A argument also failed. The claimant had not identified the circumstances in which the Council allegedly failed to have due regard to gender equality in a relevant and proportionate way. There was no evidence establishing such a failure. The other grounds had already been rejected at the permission stage.

The judgment records that permission-stage challenges based on irrationality, irrelevant considerations and inadequate consultation were rejected as unarguable. No appellate history is stated.