A female cleaner has lost a sex discrimination case against a colleague over claims he ‘deliberately splattered’ poo across the toilets for her to clean up.
Jenniene Talbot started working as a cleaner at Par Market in Cornwall in June last year- one of the UK’s biggest indoor markets.
But she ended up quitting just three weeks later after claiming she was continuously tasked with scrubbing ‘s*** filled toilets’ that were worse than any campsite, club or pub she had ever worked at.
She also accused co-worker Antony Trethewey of deliberately soiling the toilets and leaving ‘a mess’ for her to clean up after he allegedly took offence over the fact that she was a ‘mature woman’ who did her job ‘properly.’
Ms Talbot resigned in disgust and attempted to sue for employer for sex discrimination and harassment, but her case was dismissed after the tribunal ruled she had no evidence that Mr Trethewey was responsible.
The tribunal heard there are two sets of toilets at the market which receive a ‘high level of use throughout the day’ so cleaners are required to check them on a regular basis.
During the short course of Ms Talbot’s employment at the market, she raised several complaints about the cleanliness and hygiene issues on the site and highlighted an ‘alleged failure’ of male colleagues to clean them as required.
She also complained about colleague Mr Trethewey deliberately spreading excrement across toilets she was due to clean, which he would ‘not have done if she had been a man’.
On one shift, Ms Talbot was horrified to find an ‘explosion of excrement’ in the site’s disabled toilet – and blamed colleague Mr Trethewey for leaving the mess.
For the following few shifts, the cleaner continued to find soiled toilets and baby-changing units and raised concerns with her boss about their state.
She told him she had worked in pubs, clubs, campsites and restaurants but had never encountered so many ‘disgusting’ and ‘messy’ toilets as she had at the market.
During one shift mid-way through June, Ms Talboy watched her colleague head to the toilets and emerge ten minutes later, telling her he had just checked the toilet and they were fine.
The cleaner went in afterwards and was horrified to find what she described as a toilet splattered with ‘sloppy poo’ and complained again about Mr Trethewey.
Throughout the tribunal, Mr Trethewey ‘vigorously denied’ allegations that he was spreading excrement.
On June 22, Ms Talbot sent a ‘highly emotive text’ to her boss in which she said was constantly coming across ‘shit filled toilets with no tissue’ – which she alleged had been thrown in by Mr Trethewey.
She told bosses she felt ‘threatened’ and ‘anxious’ and she would no longer be able to work at the market before dropping off her uniform.
Dismissing her case, Employment Judge Ann Goraj said: ‘The Tribunal is not satisfied that [Ms Talbot] has established the factual basis of her case namely, that Mr Trethewey took excrement into /deliberately spread excrement/ soiled the respondent’s toilet.’
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