Two Employment Tribunals have handed down judgments reaching different conclusions on whether compulsory retirement at 65 amounts to discrimination on grounds of age. There is an exception to unlawful discrimination in the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006 for retirement at 65 or over but this applies only to ‘employees’ and not to partners or office-holders. Their retirement at a particular age must therefore be objectively justified in order to provide a defence to a finding of direct discrimination. Compulsory expulsion from partnership at the age of 65 was found to amount to less favourable treatment but could be justified, whereas the forced retirement of a part-time judge at 65 could not. The cases are very fact specific, but give some guidance to organisations who retain categories of individuals to whom the default retirement age of 65 does not apply, and to employers who are seeking to objectively justify a retirement age below 65.
Law Now, Solicitors