Tribunal finds Sinclair Roche guilty of sex discrimination

Sinclair Roche & Temperley, which merged with Stephenson Harwood last year, sexually discriminated against two of its female lawyers, a Reading employment tribunal has found.

The tribunal ruled that Siân Fellows, now a consultant at Richards Butler, and Siân Heard, currently an assistant at More Fisher Brown, “were not able to achieve such high billing levels and were impeded from progressing to a higher partnership level.

Consequently, their performance suffered and they also received less favourable treatment when [Sinclair Roche] started to experience financial difficulties from mid-2001.”

Allegations that the respondents were victimised were dismissed. Stephenson Harwood declined to comment.