A healthcare worker has won a claim of harassment against an NHS health board after she was not provided with a suitable private space to express breast milk.
Robyn Gibbins told an employment tribunal she felt let down by the trust in Cardiff after she was not given a room that she could lock when she came back to work from maternity leave.
Gibbins told the tribunal that a male colleague had walked in on one occasion while she was expressing and it had been suggested she prop a chair against a door to lock it.
After complaining, Gibbins received an apology and was told “things would be different” after she had her second child, the hearing was told.
But, after she returned a second time from maternity leave, Gibbins was not given a room that she could lock.
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She is set to receive a payout after an employment judge ruled that she had suffered “harassment related to sex”.
The tribunal was told that Gibbins began working at Cardiff and Vale University local health board’s Heath hospital site as a healthcare support worker in May 2019.
She returned from her first maternity leave in August 2021 and told her bosses she was planning to continue breastfeeding, requesting an internally lockable room for privacy.
But instead of a lockable room, she was given a sign to put on the door and told to put a chair up against the door, the tribunal in Cardiff heard.
Gibbins said: “It is so undignified to be asked to prop a chair up against a door to express and also it’s a fire risk.” She added that she felt “vulnerable, degraded and concerned for her privacy”.
On one occasion a male colleague “burst through the door whilst she was expressing”. It was an accident, but she reported feeling “exposed, undignified and very embarrassed”.
It was not until October that she was told that a lock – which cost just £5.50 – had been fitted on to a ward manager’s door.
When Gibbins returned to work after her second maternity leave in 2023, a lockable room was available only at certain times. She said she was worried about becoming unwell and felt like a “burden”.
Employment Judge Rachel Harfield said: “Expressing is an intimate, personal activity where what are the appropriate arrangements will vary from individual to individual.
“Different people will have different expectations and preferences as to what constitutes privacy for them. It is important that an expressing mother feels secure and relaxed when expressing because otherwise expressing may not be effective.
“We find that the absence of the lock left [Gibbins] feeling worried, apprehensive and anxious, even with the do not disturb sign, about the risk of people walking in.
“She felt belittled by the lock not being provided, by her needs not being met, that her needs were not being taken seriously and by her ongoing resulting vulnerability that could leave her exposed or by not being able to express effectively.
“Not being given an internally lockable room on the ward was, in our judgment, unwanted conduct that related to sex in the sense of being related to breastfeeding.”
A trust spokesperson said: “Cardiff and Vale University Health Board is committed to ensuring all colleagues are treated respectfully, with dignity and without discrimination or prejudice. We are fully cooperating with the employment tribunal and are unable to comment further at this stage.”
A hearing to decide Gibbins’s compensation will be held at a later date.
