UK unlawful discrimination lawsuit claims Abercrombie & Fitch made employee work in stockroom because she didn't fit its "look policy"

From the Daily Mail in London, the United Kingdom, June 14, 2009

A disabled law student is suing retailer Abercrombie & Fitch for discrimination, claiming it made her work in a stockroom because her prosthetic arm didn't fit its public image.

Riam Dean, 22, was just days into a part-time job at the U.S. firm's flagship London store when she says she was asked to leave the shop floor.

She claims she was told she broke the company's 'Look Policy', which dictates how members of staff are meant to present themselves.

The company has been criticised for recruiting only young and beautiful assistants and was recently forced to settle a £25million law suit over the issue in the U.S.

Shoppers entering its new Savile Row shop are greeted by two bare-chested young men, clad in low-slung jeans and flip flops.

Miss Dean applied for a job with the company last May to fund the final months of her law degree at London's Queen Mary University.

She was born with her left forearm missing and has worn a prosthetic limb since she was three months old but insists she has never allowed her disability to get in her way.

She said: 'I was never asked whether I had a disability at my interview and, to be honest, it never occurred to me to mention it.

'It wouldn't stop me doing my job and I certainly didn't want or expect any special treatment.

'All they seemed interested in was taking my photograph to make sure I had the right image.'

After being told she had got the job she went along to an induction day where she was issued a 45-page handbook listing in minute detail the company's strict Look Policy.

It stipulates that staff must represent a 'natural, classic American style' and instructs them on everything from how to wear their hair (clean and natural) to how long they should wear their nails (a quarter of an inch past the end of the finger).

She was also given a uniform of jeans and a polo shirt, although the company handbook does state that sales associates can wear their own clothing as long as it is in 'Abercrombie style'.

Miss Dean, who normally wears long-sleeved tops to disguise the join between her upper arm and artificial limb, says she was told to buy a plain white cardigan to wear over her uniform.

But matters came to a head a few days later.

'A worker from what they call the "visual team", people who are employed to go round making sure the shop and its staff look up to scratch, came up to me and demanded I take the cardigan off.

'I told her, yet again, that I had been given special permission to wear it,' she recalled.
'A few minutes later my manager came over to me and said: "I can't have you on the shop floor as you are breaking the Look Policy. Go to the stockroom immediately and I'll get someone to replace you."

'I pride myself on being quite a confident girl but I had never experienced prejudice like that before and it made me feel utterly worthless.

'Afterwards I telephoned the company's head office where a member of staff asked whether I was willing to work in the stockroom until the winter uniform arrived.

'That was the final straw. I just couldn't go back.'

Miss Dean, who has just sat her final law exams, is due to take her case to the Central London Employment Tribunal later this month and is seeking damages of £25,000.

Four years ago, Abercrombie settled the £25million lawsuit, in which nine former employees accused the firm of discrimination.

The litigants, all from ethnic minority groups, said they were forced to work in stockrooms or take night shifts because they did not fit the 'Abercrombie look'.

A spokesman for Abercrombie & Fitch said: 'A&F has a strong anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policy and is committed to providing a supportive and dignified environment for all of its employees.'

"Halting the slaughter of Albino innocents"

Photo description: Albino children take a break on Jan. 25, 2009 in a recreational hall at the Mitindo Primary School for the blind, which has become a rare santuary for albino children.

Following is an excerpt from this story in Canada's National Post about the killing of albino people in Tanzania for their body parts, and the efforts of philanthropist Peter Ash's foundation Under the Same Sun to help stop them. According to official numbers, at least 45 albino people have been killed but the real number may be closer to double that. See also this earlier article in the New York Times.

To the vicious hunters of northwestern Tanzania, she is "zeru zeru" -- invisible, inhuman, a ghost.

Under cover of darkness, a group of men charge into young Viviana's room in the middle of the night, pin her pale form immobile, and hack off one of her little legs as her sister screams in horror.

Viviana, shockingly, is among the lucky ones. The commotion draws the attention of neighbours, and the attackers slip off into the night without finishing the job. She is left an amputee, but alive.

The single albino leg will fetch upwards of $1,000 in a gruesome market controlled by powerful Tanzanian witch doctors, who grind the bones into potions and repurpose them as good luck charms for struggling miners and fishermen.

The story sounds apocryphal, yet albinos are shunned and subject to social discrimination in many parts of Africa. There are reports of albinos being murdered in Burundi, and in Tanzania many albinos fear being kidnapped, dismembered, murdered.

The full story here ...

Australia - Another family's application for residency refused because child has Down syndrome

From The Age (Melbourne, Australia)

Dozens of families with Down syndrome children are rejected for permanent migration to Australia each year, the Down Syndrome Association of WA says.

Another case has emerged of a family's application for residency being rejected on the basis of their child having Down syndrome.

A British midwife working at Joondalup Hospital in Perth is due to leave Australia after failing in a six-year battle to win permanent residency, News Ltd reports on Sunday.

The woman's Down syndrome child was not individually assessed as part of that process.

"This is standard practice," Down Syndrome Association of WA migration spokesman Jan Gothard told AAP.

"It is literally the tip of the iceberg ... people ... go through all the hoops ... they're absolutely fine and then they get the letter back saying, `everybody's fine except your son failed the health test', Dr Gothard said.

"This happens all the time."

"The child could be perfectly healthy, absolutely no health issues at all, but they have a disability."

The Perth midwife has had her application assessed by the Migration Review Tribunal and her future in Australia now rests with Immigration Minister Chris Evans.

Her case follows that of Lukas Moeller, the Down syndrome son of German doctor Bernhard Moeller, who brought his family to Horsham in Victoria two years ago.

That decision is now being challenged by the federal health minister and the Victorian premier.

"Migrants bring a net benefit to the economy ... why do we look at people with disabilities and see them only as costs?," Dr Gothard said.

"We don't look at someone and say, oh you can't bring your aged or elderly mother because she might be a cost to the community."

The Down syndrome association says laws which exempt the Migration Act from the provisions of the Disability Discrimination Act need to be changed.

See earlier story:

Australia: No residency for boy with Down syndrome

Australia - Doctor refused visa because of his son's disability

From the Age (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia):

The immigration department has defended its decision to deny residency to a German doctor because his son is disabled.

Bernhard Moeller moved with his family to rural Horsham in Victoria two years ago to help fill a doctor shortage.

Dr Moeller has a temporary 457 visa which is valid until 2010, but has been denied permanent residency because his 13-year-old son, Lukas, has Down Syndrome.

The Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) said Dr Moeller's application had been refused because Lukas did not meet the health requirement.

"A medical officer of the commonwealth assessed that his son's existing medical condition was likely to result in a significant and ongoing cost to the Australian community," a departmental spokesman said.

"Decisions by these medical officers are legally binding. The department must follow them." The department stressed the decision was not discriminatory.

"A disability in itself is not grounds for failing the health requirement - it is a question of the cost implications to the community."

The health requirement contains spending on health and community services, he said.

"If we did not have a health requirement, the costs to the community and health system would not be sustainable."

Dr Moeller intends to appeal the decision to the Migration Review Tribunal.

Immigration Minister Chris Evans has no power to intervene in the case until such time as the tribunal or a court affirms the department's decision.

Employees with disabilities allege bias at SSA

See this article by that title. It begins:

Barbara Penny, a former supervisor at the Social Security Administration, says employees with disabilities at the agency are passed over for training and are viewed as a costly burden because they often require special accommodations, such as interpreters or electronic readers. As a result, they aren’t promoted as often as other employees.

In at least one instance, Penny, who lives in Auburn, Wash., said she and other members of a panel charged with reviewing top candidates for a job opening at the agency were provided details on each candidate’s race, gender and disabilities — factors that shouldn’t be considered in personnel decisions. The list was shredded after the selection panel made its decision, she said.

“There is no doubt in my mind that disability was a factor in decision-making because it was more convenient for SSA not to pick the disabled person who needed an expensive accommodation,” she said. Penny’s account is laid out in a new discrimination complaint that charges Social Security with systemic discrimination against employees with disabilities. More than 40 current and former employees who say they were denied promotions at the agency have provided statements in support of the complaint, which was filed June 27 before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Eugenics 2008? The deportation of Lucy Chapman

That's the title of this post over at What Sorts of People about 7-year-old Lucy Chapman: as reported earlier, Lucy Chapman and her parents were deported from Canada in July, 2008, because, her parents claim, Lucy has a disability.

Here is part of Professor Sobsey's post about the case:

When Mr. and Mrs. Chapman, both former police officers, arrived in Canada with their two Children to move into their newly purchased home in Fall River, Nova Scotia in July, 2008, however, they were turned away.

The story has received considerable coverage in the UK and quote the Chapmans who claim the Immigration Official explicitly told them that they were being denied because their daughter’s disability meant they were banned for life.

.....

Canadian News sources have not given the story much coverage and Canadian officials claim that the couple was deported for other reasons but refuse to specify those reasons. See, the following story, for Canadian coverage. Brit family being deported but the question is why: Family thinks it’s because their child is disabled; MP told there’s more to it

Canadians and people with disabilities need a proper explanation. If there is no truth to these allegations, the air needs to be cleared. If there is even a bit of truth, it needs to be told and something needs to change. It is shame that it took a Supreme Court Decision in 2005 to get this policy changed, but it would be much greater shame if Canada continued to deft the court ruling through deceit.

This is only part of a much longer post. The full post is here...

Canada asks a British family to leave the country because their daughter has a disability

This story comes via Beth Haller over at Media-dis&dat. And William Peace over at the Bad Cripple has posted this about it.

Here is part of what he writes:

Last month a British family tried to move to Canada. Paul and Barbara-Anne Chapman, their two children, Jack and Lucy, as well as their dog, planned to move to Nova Scotia and open a business. Three years of careful planning was undermined on July 12 when they met with a Canadian Border Guard in Halifax. Apparently the Border Guard told the Chapman's they could not legally enter the country because their daughter was disabled. Lucy, 7 years old has Angelman Syndrome, a rare chromosome disorder. The Border Guard stated her daughter was banned from ever entering Canada under section 38 of the Federal Immigration Act. Despite concerted efforts to appeal this ban, the family was forced to return to Britain on July 30.