A recent case before the Victorian Supreme Court of Appeal,
Ferris v State of Victoria [2018] VSCA 240, serves as a reminder for
employers that they can be found guilty of unlawful discrimination
even if they were unaware of their employee’s disability, or
the discriminatory effect of its requirements on individual
employees.
Discrimination occurs when a
person with a disability is treated differently to a person without
a disability. This can be either ‘direct’
discrimination, or ‘indirect’ discrimination.
Direct discrimination refers to a
person being treated less favourably than another person because of
certain personal characteristics, such as age, disability or
gender. Indirect discrimination refers to an unreasonable rule or
policy which applies to everyone equally, however due to a
person’s attributes, they are unfairly affected.
