News

A woman working for an East Kent employer yesterday won £5,000 in compensation after her boss kept breaking wind in front of her reports the Mirror.

Theresa Bailey, 43, from Deal complained to senior managers about the "laddish" behaviour among the men. She was the only woman on the firm's sales team.

Mrs Bailey said line manager David Nye regularly "lifted his right cheek" in her direction and broke wind.

The mother of three children was made to wear a badge saying "I'm simple" after after she failed to understand some functions on her computer. And she had a beach ball thrown at her head when she challenged sexist banter.

When she complained about the state of the communal loos at direct marketing firm Selectabase, in Deal, Kent, Mr Nye emailed a colleague: "That's why we don't employ women."

Her payout came after a tribunal ruled she would not have suffered the same treatment if she were a man.

She sent an email to company director Steve Selwood saying: "The number of times the person at my side would lift up his bottom off the chair and fart and think it's funny is unreal.

I am no prude but I do think there is a time and a place for that behaviour."

She told the hearing in Ashford: "I felt so humiliated, my heart sank."

Afterwards, a Selectabase spokesman said the firm had 12 years of excellent employee relations. A director of the company described the tribunal’s finding as unfair.