An employment tribunal stands accused of a conflict of interest following a racism row that has divided the conciliation service Acas, originally designed to provide impartial advice on workplace relations (The Telegraph).
Mohammad Taj was one of two lay members of the tribunal which ruled that had not discriminated against Sean Corby, its former employee.
Since then, it has emerged that Mr Taj is a close political associate of Zita Holbourne, one of the Acas staff whose initial complaints of racism against Mr Corby caused him to appeal to the tribunal. Mr Corby believes this represents a clear conflict of interest.
Mr Corby was a former senior conciliator at Acas, otherwise known as the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service.) He argues he was harassed and discriminated against after his employer ordered him to remove posts, published on its internal bulletin, on the contentious subject of critical race theory (CRT).
Mr Corby has a black Jamaican wife and mixed heritage children. He had written that he believed CRT, an influential ideology contending that racism is systematically embedded across society, divides victims of oppression.
Commending the approach of the Reverend Martin Luther King, the civil servant argued that he preferred to “judge a man by the content of his character rather than the colour of his skin”. In his posts, Mr Corby approvingly quoted Howard Thurman, a civil rights leader who greatly influenced Martin Luther King, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the Nigerian writer known for her wry criticism of cancel culture.
As a result of these actions, Zita Holbourne and several of her colleagues accused Mr Corby of racism. They complained that Mr Corby’s comments demonstrated “a deep-rooted hatred towards black and minority ethnic people who challenge racism, organise in black structures and safe spaces and mobilise against racism” and promoted “racist ideas”.
His colleagues added that they would not feel “safe to be in contact with him in person,” questioning his right to be employed by Acas.
Acas disciplined Mr Corby, ordering him to permanently remove what he maintained were “objectively inoffensive” statements. He was subsequently dismissed from the organisation for discussing his case with the media.
Following this, Mr Corby took the conciliation service to the tribunal and accused Acas of discriminating against him by ordering him to remove eight of the posts from its Diversity and Inclusion Forum.
In September last year, the panel, composed of Employment Judge Kirsty Ayre, Ms B R Hodgkinson and Mr Taj, ruled that Mr Corby’s opposition to CTR was a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act.
However, eight months later, it ruled that Acas had not treated Mr Corby unlawfully by demanding that he remove his posts. The justification for this was that Acas had “a duty of care” to take action where others had taken offence. As such, the tribunal determined that this was lawful because Mr Corby’s belief “genuinely upsets a group of employees”.
Since then, Mr Corby’s barrister discovered that Mr Taj was a veteran trade unionist who had collaborated with Ms Holbourne, a former vice-president of the Public and Commercial Services Union. Ms Holbourne was one of the colleagues who accused Mr Corby of racism.
The pair both support the Black Lives Matter movement and jointly sat on the TUC’s race relations committee for several years. During, this time they attended several political campaigns together, such as the launch of a charter for racial justice in the House of Commons with Diane Abbott MP in 2014.
The following year the pair shared a platform at a Refugees Welcome Here TUC fringe meeting. Moreover, they have jointly signed numerous open letters, including one in May 2020 protesting against a “premature end” to the Covid lockdown.
As a result of this close association, Mr Corby argues that Mr Taj should have recused himself as having a conflict of interest in the case.
Speaking The Telegraph, Mr Corby said: “To learn that Mohamed Taj has worked closely with Zita Holbourne, a prolific political activist, on numerous political events and campaigns relating to the very issues my case concerns is absolutely unacceptable and has given me no faith that I received a fair hearing in April.”
Mr Taj had previously stood down from a tribunal case involving the Christian beliefs of an employee named Felix Ngole because he had long supported LGBTQI+ rights.
Mr Corby is now appealing against the tribunal’s decision, arguing its ruling represents a “heckler’s veto” effectively depriving people of the right to free speech.
“Given that there was no conceivable objectively offensive content to my posts, which were unmistakably anti-racist in nature, the decision to rule in Acas’s favour and therefore sanction the behaviour of Zita and her fellow complainants is in my view gravely mistaken,” said Mr Corby.
“The implications of such a ruling are very worrying for our democratic right to freedom of speech.”
Mr Corby continues to await the result of an unfair dismissal claim against Acas.
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