School worker sacked for LGBT+ posts wins appeal

A Christian school worker sacked after sharing posts about LGBT+ relationships teaching in school has won a Court of Appeal battle.

Kristie Higgs lost her role as a pastoral administrator and work experience manager at Farmor's School in Fairford, Gloucestershire, in 2019.

She had challenged in 2023 employment appeal tribunal judgement, which ruled in her favour but sent the case back to another tribunal for a fresh decision on whether on dismissal was lawful - a step her lawyers described as "unnecessary".

In the judgement published on Wednesday, three judges ruled in her favour and found the decision to take the case back to an employment tribunals was "unlawfully discriminatory".

In October 2018, Mrs Higgs shared two posts to Facebook to about 100 friends under her maiden name, one of which referred to "brainwashing our children".

Another referred to "suppressing Christianity and removing it from the public arena".

The posts referred to LGBT+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) teaching at her son's Church of England primary school, rather than at the school she worked at.

In the ruling handed down earlier, Lord Justice Underhill, sitting with Lord Justice Bean and Lady Justice Falk, said Ms Higgs had posted messages "mostly quoted from other sources, objecting to government policy on sex education in primary schools because of its promotion of 'gender fluidity' and its equation of same-sex marriage with marriage between a man and a woman".

The ruling said it was not disputed that Mrs Higgs' beliefs that gender is binary and same-sex marriage cannot be equated to marriage between a man and a woman were protected by the Equality Act.

The school had dismissed Mrs Higgs for gross misconduct, on the basis that her posts were liable to damage the school's reputation.

In their ruling, the judges said neither the language of Mrs Higgs' posts or the risk of reputational damage to the school were capable of justifying her dismissal when she "had not said anything of the kind at work or displayed any discriminatory attitudes in her treatment of pupils".

Speaking outside court, Mrs Higgs said: "I pray that today will prove to be a landmark day for Christian freedoms and free speech.

"Christians have the right to express their beliefs on social media and at other non-work-related settings without fear of being punished by their employer."

Sean Jones KC, for the school, told the court in a written submission that remitting the case was "the appropriate course", adding Mrs Higgs "was not dismissed for manifesting (her beliefs) but because the manner in which it was manifested could reasonably have caused and did cause others to think she was expressing homophobic or transphobic views".