Bullying at work

Green v DB Group Services [2006] All ER (D) 02 (Aug) (QBD); NLJ 29 September

The claimant employee was the victim of two separate campaigns of harassment at work. The first was one of relentless spiteful behaviour by four women who worked in close proximity to the claimant. Following the House of Lords’ decision in Majrowski v Guy’s & St Thomas’s NHS Trust [2006] All ER (D) 146 (Jul); 25/ LL p90 the claimant contended that her employer, the defendant bank, was vicariously liable for the harassment. The bank contended that the women did not work with the claimant; that their behaviour had nothing to do with either their work or hers; their employment simply provided an opportunity for them to behave in the way that they did. The court rejected these arguments finding that the women’s behaviour directly affected the working environment within the claimant’s department. The second campaign was a concerted and aggressively competitive course of conduct by a work rival to advance himself at the expense of undermining the claimant. Vicarious liability again attached to the bank because his behaviour was clearly within the scope of his employment and was directly and intimately connected to his work.