CA-2025-000983 - [2025] EWCA Civ 1457

Section 20 of the Equality Act 2010 defines the duty to make reasonable adjustmentswhere the Act imposes such a duty, but it does not explain who owes that duty. Similarly, section 21 defines a failure to comply with the duty to make reasonable adjustments, but this too does not say who owes that duty. This is dealt with (for present purposes) in section 29 of the Act, which imposes a duty to make reasonable adjustments on persons providing services to the public or a section of the public. The appellant submits that this imposes a legal duty on courts and tribunals to ensure that he is not discriminated against in the provision of judicial services.

That would be so if it were not for Schedule 3, para. 3 of the Act. This states that section 29 does not apply to a judicial function. In ruling on the appellant’s application, Judge Beard was exercising a judicial function. Similarly, when dealing with the appellant’s appeal, the EAT will be exercising a judicial function. It is clear, therefore, that the Equality Act duty does not apply, as was recognised by this court in J v K (EHRC intervening) [2019] EWCA Civ 5, para 33 and by the EAT itself in Heal v University of Oxford [2020] ICR 1294, para 18.

However, this is of no real practical significance, at least in this case, because both this court in J v K and the EAT in Heal accepted that, as a matter of the general law, the exercise of a judicial discretion must take into account all relevant considerations, which include a party’s disability. Similarly, in Rackham v NHS Professionals Ltd [2015] UKEAT/0110/15/LA Mr Justice Langstaff giving the judgment of the EAT said that:

‘32. We do not think it could sensibly be disputed that a Tribunal has a duty as an organ of the state, as a public body, to make reasonable adjustments to accommodate the disabilities of Claimants.’

In this regard, the rights contained in Articles 6 and 14 of the ECHR add nothing of substance to what is already inherent in the common law duty of fairness (J v K, para 36; Heal, para 20; and see also the decision of the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal in Galo v Bombardier Aerospace UK [2016] NICA 25, paras 47-51).

I would therefore accept that a court or tribunal is required to make reasonable adjustments to alleviate substantial disadvantage related to disability in a party's ability to participate in proceedings. But full weight must be given in this formulation to the word ‘reasonable’. The Judicial College Equal Treatment Bench Book identifies some of the adjustments which may be reasonable in particular cases.