A council worker has won £10,544 in compensation and got his job back after a Tribunal ruled he was unfairly dismissed for failing to tell his bosses that he suffered from a bad back.
Joseph McCormick was hired by East Dunbartonshire Council to collect rubbish for recycling in February 2005.
When he went off sick with a sore back for three weeks last summer and the council dismissed him for his failure disclose his history of back pain.
The Employment Tribunal heard that Mr McCormick sustained a back injury while working as a miner 17 years ago.
At his interview for his job with East Dunbartonshire he was given a medical questionnaire to fill in, but failed to mention the injury.
He said that he was not informed the medical questionnaire formed part of the recruitment procedure, that he completed the form in a hurry, and understood the question relating to back pain or injury only related to the previous 12 months.
Employment judge Frances Eccles ruled that Mr McCormick who comes from Kirkintilloch was unfairly dismissed.
Mr McCormick was given £10,544 compensation for lost wages and the council was ordered to reinstate him to his previous job by October 13.
Rory McPherson employment law specialist with ‘No Win No Fee’ lawyers Thompsons Solicitors said: “Employers always have to ask themselves if they are behaving reasonably if it is their intention to dismiss someone.
"In this case the Tribunal held that the council failed that test by not explaining to their employee the significance of declaring his medical history and that he was therefore entitled to compensation for his loss of earnings and to be reinstated."
Thompsons Solicitors is Scotland’s leading personal injury specialists law firm offering No Win No Fee services to clients who suffer personal injuries, caused by a car accident, a car crash, a road traffic accident or whose lives have been blighted by industrial diseases.
Last year Thompsons won over £1 million a week in compensation for its clients.
Thompsons Solicitors won the prestigious Law Firm of the Year award at the Law Awards of Scotland organised by The Firm legal magazine.