Yahoo Finance Asda begins Supreme Court equal pay fight with supermarket staff
The Supreme Court is considering an equal pay claim brought against Asda by its employees.
More than 30,000 workers, most of them women, have complained that staff working in distribution depots unfairly get more money.
On Monday five Supreme Court justices began to consider whether Asda supermarket workers were entitled to compare themselves to distribution staff for equal pay purposes.
It comes after the US-owned supermarket said the roles are not comparable. It is trying to get a 2019 court of appeal ruling on the matter overturned.
Lord Pannick QC, who is leading Asda’s legal team, told justices that the issue was whether hourly-paid store workers could bring equal pay claims because they were “in the same employment” as the supermarket's hourly-paid distribution workers.
“Asda submits that the answer is no,” he said, in a written case outline.
“Under domestic legislation, a claimant in an equal pay case may not compare her work and her pay with that of another employee who is employed, even by the same employer, in a different establishment unless the terms of those doing the claimant’s work are common irrespective of the establishment, or type of establishment, at which they work, and the terms of those doing the comparator’s work are common irrespective of the establishment, or type of establishment, at which they work.”
He said terms of working conditions depended on the type of establishment at which people worked and added: “The different types of establishment operate in different geographical locations, in different industries and with different pay-setting processes.”
Law firm Leigh Day is representing Asda supermarket workers in the case and the team will have to prove the supermarket and distribution roles are of equal value.
Lauren Lougheed, an employment law specialist at the firm, said she was hopeful that supermarket staff would win the Supreme Court fight and “prove once and for all that the roles are comparable”.
A Leigh Day spokeswoman said if the Asda supermarket staff won, there would be implications for all major supermarkets.
She said lawyers believed that, if the Asda supermarket staff won – and 500,000 eligible staff across the industry made successful claims – then supermarket bosses could owe a total of £8 billion compensation.
Justices are considering rival arguments at a virtual Supreme Court hearing due to end on Tuesday.
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