British women accuse Washington of ‘arrogance’ after being barred from UK discrimination claims Exclusive: Pentagon uses ‘state immunity’ rules to halt tribunal

Two British women barred by the US government from bringing discrimination claims have accused Washington of “utter arrogance” and spoken of their incomprehension at being deprived of the right to have their cases heard on UK soil.

Anthea Webster and Caroline Wright, who lost their jobs on two US air bases after developing serious medical conditions, were told last week that their claims of misconduct against US authorities could not proceed after the Pentagon insisted that a UK employment tribunal had no jurisdiction.

Both women expressed anger at what they consider to be a calculated strategy by the US military to deny them access to justice after months of allegedly callous treatment when they found themselves unable to work because of illness.

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Ms Wright, 36, said she had been put through months of distress after having a seizure in February 2017 which was later diagnosed as epilepsy and successfully treated. She contrasted her treatment by Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue Service, where she had remained an on-call firefighter, with that of her American employers at RAF Croughton, the highly sensitive US Air force intelligence facility in Northamptonshire.

Barred from UK discrimination claims

She said: “It was a terrible time after my initial seizure. It came out of the blue and for a while we didn’t know if we were dealing with a brain tumour or something similar.

“After my diagnosis, my British employers did everything they could to ensure I could get back to work. But the Americans really did not want to know. At one point they asked me to send a letter explaining why I was unable to work. When I replied saying I wanted to work, in fact that I was desperate to work, they actually sent me another letter saying I had gone Awol.

“The shutters came down and for me it seemed the Americans had decided that if they did nothing I would eventually give up and go away.”

Ms Wright, who was forced to resign in January 2018, and Ms Webster, who worked as a records management officer at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk until being dismissed in October 2017 when she developed a debilitating medical condition, were both employed directly by the American government as British civilians, with a promise that their rights under UK law would be respected.

‘State immunity’

i has been shown documents available on the UK website of the US Air Force which state that UK civilians employed on air bases “are entitled to all rights and entitlements afforded under UK law”, including employment and equality legislation.

But when the two women felt their complaints had not been dealt with adequately and sought an employment tribunal to claim for discrimination on grounds including sex and disability, the US authorities hired one of Britain’s top lawyers, Professor Dan Sarooshi, to successfully argue that the claims had to be struck out on the basis of “state immunity”.

Under this rule, a state has a legal right to bar a court or judge from another state from investigating its “sovereign acts”, even if those actions occur on the territory of the other state.

Ms Webster, who like Ms Wright is a UK citizen who has lived in Britain all her life, said she felt she had faced a constant struggle since taking up a post at RAF Lakenheath, including having to make 30 separate applications for her job title to be changed when she was given an enhanced role. She said her job stress became so intense that she had a breakdown and was forced to leave her post in 2016.

‘We haven’t been given justice’

Ms Webster, who is also claiming race discrimination, said: “It was a daily battle and now at the end of it we find that we haven’t been given any justice. We haven’t been allowed to make our case and British people should be aware now that they may not get justice in court if they choose to be employed by the country that is supposed to be our closest ally.”

Ms Wright said: “It is utter arrogance on the part of the American authorities. What we have been put through seems to be an exercise in flexing their muscles. It feels to me that the British general public and their employees just don’t matter to them.”

Both women are intending to appeal the employment tribunal ruling but are unable to fund the expert legal representation needed.

The American government has not commented on the cases.