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Payout for gay jibes
Page 9
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A MANAGER FOR waste company Cleanaway has won a landmark case at an employment tribunal after enduring constant taunts over his homosexuality.
Rob Whitfield, who earned £54,000 a year as a business transformation manager, is the first person to win a case on the basis of discrimination stemming from his sexual orientation.
Ile won £35,500 compensation after the tribunal heard how he had been humiliated by managers of staff at the Brentwood company and nicknamed "Sebastian" after a gay character in the BBC comedy Little Britain. Whitfield started working for the company in March 2003: the comments started in December of that year and became worse.
The tribunal heard that directors presented him with a tee-shirt with pink lettering before a conference of 60 colleagues and that he was called a queen and a queer.
Whitfield says the workplace was always "jokey-, but when the insults became more sinister and sustained he felt forced to resign.
"I am very pleased with the result." he says. 'The more people do this the harder it is for companies and employees to get away with it."
A Cleanaway spokeswoman says: "Cleanaway is committed to treating everyone fairly, irrespective of their sexual orientation.