Equal pay

Case 6: The facts

Six male civil servants who worked for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) brought equal pay claims, using as comparators women who worked for the Department of Transport, Environment and the Regions (DETR).

All the workers were employed by the Crown, but DEFRA and DETR set their own pay and conditions.

The ruling

The Court of Appeal relied on the European Court of Justice's judgement in Lawrence v Regent Office Care, which stated that an equal pay claim cannot be brought where the difference in pay cannot be attributed to a single source.

It held that DEFRA and DETR were separate sources, and that this was the reason for the difference in pay. There was no single source responsible for the difference in pay, so the claims could not succeed.

Robertson & others v DEFRA [2005] EWCA (Civ) 138