Piepenbrock v The London School of Economics And Political Science

An employer may owe a duty to manage a workplace harassment complaint promptly, confidentially and in accordance with its applicable procedure. Delay, unnecessary redaction and failure to contain dissemination may constitute breaches of that duty. Foreseeable stress and anxiety are insufficient, however. Liability for psychiatric injury requires reasonably foreseeable psychiatric harm to the particular employee, having regard to information about that employee’s vulnerability. The claimant’s harassment claim failed because the conduct complained of was not oppressive and unacceptable to the criminal-law standard. The negligence and contractual claims also failed because psychiatric injury was not reasonably foreseeable on the facts.

The claimant, a Teaching Fellow, claimed damages for psychiatric injury arising from his employment by the defendant. He alleged that a former graduate teaching assistant had harassed him, that the defendant had breached its contractual harassment procedure, and that its handling of her complaint had been negligent. The defendant denied liability and disputed both foreseeability and the diagnosis of depressive illness.

The court considered the alleged dissemination of the complaint, the delays in the defendant’s response, the contractual procedure, causation and the competing psychiatric evidence.

1. Protection from Harassment Act 1997. The statutory test required conduct amounting to harassment, namely conduct of sufficient gravity to justify criminal sanctions. The complaint made by the former teaching assistant concerned substantially undisputed events in Seattle and was not malicious, oppressive or unacceptable. Although dissemination was inappropriate, it did not satisfy the statutory threshold. The claim under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 therefore failed.
2. Duty of care. The defendant failed properly to manage the complaint. It should promptly have established whether the complaint was formal, instructed that it remain confidential, disclosed the written complaint within days, and disclosed it in unredacted form. Those failures breached the duty of care because they unnecessarily prolonged the process and increased foreseeable stress and anxiety. Other complaints, including the restriction on the claimant’s attendance at graduation and the limitation on choosing a teaching assistant, did not amount to breaches.
3. Contract. The defendant’s harassment procedure formed part of the claimant’s contract. The refusal to allow his wife to act as his “friend” was a breach of paragraph 9(d), although the contractual claim added little to the negligence claim.
4. Foreseeability and outcome. Applying the principles in Hatton v Sutherland [2002] EWCA Civ 76 and the related authorities, the court distinguished foreseeable stress from foreseeable psychiatric injury. The defendant had no relevant information about any previous vulnerability or psychiatric history. Before the claimant’s collapse he continued working, travelled to India and discussed future employment. His severe reaction reflected his personality and was not reasonably foreseeable. The claim consequently failed and there was judgment for the defendant.