'Degraded & humiliated' | Race harassment victory for Irish employee over 'potato' & 'stupid Paddy' comments

An Irish office manager whose boss repeatedly shouted “potato” at her “in a strong Irish accent”, alongside other insults, has won a race harassment and victimisation claim. 

An Employment Tribunal held in Leeds found that Ms B Hayes had been subjected to repeated comments about her Irish heritage over a six-month period at construction firm West Leeds Civils, including being called “potato”, “paddy”, “stupid paddy” and “pikey”. The tribunal also found the company later victimised her by pursuing “entirely baseless and historic allegations of gross misconduct” after she raised complaints.

Overseeing the case, Judge Buckley found that the harassment claim centred on comments made by director Mr Atkins between late December 2023 and late June 2024. The judgment says: “The language used by Mr Atkins is either ‘potato’ ‘paddy’ ‘stupid paddy’ or ‘pikey’.”

Importantly, the judge found that Atkins did not dispute having said or written the comments relied on by Hayes. The tribunal said: “Mr Atkins did not deny that he said or wrote any of the comments alleged by the claimant to amount to race discrimination or harassment.”