A recent employment tribunal decision has attracted attention after finding that a manager’s description of “two coloured ladies” did not amount to unlawful harassment. That finding should not be mistaken for approval of the language, or taken as establishing a wider rule about what employers can safely tolerate in the workplace.
Far from it. A Reeves v Kier instead provides a valuable illustration of how employers should respond when concerns about discrimination are raised, while also highlighting the distinction between unacceptable workplace conduct and conduct that meets the statutory threshold for harassment.
The case in brief
Amy Reeves worked as a commercial administrator for construction and infrastructure company Kier. During her employment she raised concerns about several incidents, including a manager’s reference to “two coloured ladies outside,” a colleague’s description of a tenant as a “little old black lady,” and a number of other incidents involving the way managers and colleagues spoke to or treated her, the handling of her work, and changes to her contract. She alleged that some of this treatment was because of her race, and that other treatment amounted to victimisation for having raised her concerns about discrimination. She later brought a grievance covering all of these issues, went on sick leave, and resigned, before pursuing claims of harassment related to race, victimisation and direct race discrimination.
The tribunal, chaired by Employment Judge Kirsty Ayre, unanimously dismissed the
claims. But when it came to the harassment claim concerning the “two coloured
ladies” comment, the precise reason it failed is important.
Here, the tribunal accepted that this specific comment related to race, that Ms Reeves was upset by it and that it had the proscribed effect on her for the purposes of section 26 of the Equality Act 2010.
The claim failed because the tribunal went on to conclude that, in these particular circumstances, it was not reasonable for the comment to have the effect that it did. It took account of the fact that it was a one-off remark, was not directed at Ms Reeves and had been used descriptively rather than with the intention of causing offence.
That distinction is the real heart of the judgment. The comment was not found to be harmless. It was found not to satisfy the statutory reasonableness requirement once all the circumstances were taken into account.
A tribunal threshold is not a workplace standard
Section 26 requires unwanted conduct related to a protected characteristic that has the purpose, or the effect, of violating dignity or creating a hostile, intimidating, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment. Where the alleged effect rather than purpose is in issue, the tribunal must consider the employee’s perception, the other circumstances of the case, and whether it was reasonable for the conduct to have that effect. The tribunal in this case rehearsed the established principles from Richmond Pharmacology v Dhaliwal and Land Registry v Grant, both of which confirm that harassment does not require an intention to offend and that a single incident can in principle be enough.
None of that makes intent or frequency part of the legal test itself. They are simply factors that can inform whether the reasonableness threshold is met on the specific facts. Employers should be wary of drawing a general rule from a finding that turned on a very particular combination of circumstances. A tribunal’s job is to apply that statutory test, not to endorse workplace culture, and a term falling short of the legal definition of harassment says nothing about whether it belongs in a modern workplace. Training, policies and day-to-day management should be built around the standard an employer wants to set, not the minimum a tribunal happened to require on one set of facts.
There is a further reason for caution, however, as this was a first-instance Employment Tribunal decision, not a binding precedent establishing that particular words are acceptable or incapable of amounting to harassment. A different factual context could in practice produce a very different result.
What Kier got right, and what that did and did not achieve
There is a great deal in the judgment to support Kier’s handling of the situation. When Ms Reeves first raised concerns, her manager offered to escalate to HR and intervene directly. When she declined that and asked him not to take it further, he instead issued a wider “Expect Respect” refresher to the team without identifying her. Once the formal grievance followed, the employer offered welfare contact, the option to work from home, a change of manager, an alternative grievance hearer and location, and the option to answer written questions rather than attend a meeting. It continued investigating the allegations even after Ms Reeves’ participation became limited and she subsequently resigned.
However, it wasn’t good process that won the case. A well-run grievance does not neutralise conduct that has already crossed the legal threshold, and several of the victimisation complaints here failed for a quite different and more specific reasons, namely, that the individuals said to have acted against Ms Reeves did not know about her protected acts, so they could not have been motivated by them.
A good grievance handling process will not cure discriminatory conduct that has already occurred. What it can do is prevent an employer compounding the problem, reduce the risk of further allegations, and provide contemporaneous evidence that concerns were taken seriously.
In Reeves, the tribunal’s findings about the employer’s sustained efforts to communicate with Ms Reeves, accommodate her circumstances and investigate her allegations mattered a great deal when it came to assessing the complaints about the grievance process itself.
A discrimination complaint does not need to look like a grievance
Ms Reeves’ original message to a senior manager in March, raising concerns about the comments she had heard, was found by the tribunal to be a protected act under section 27. It did not reference the Equality Act, cite a particular legal provision, or contain the level of detail typically expected in a formal grievance. The tribunal rejected Kier’s argument that the message was too vague to count, on the basis that Ms Reeves had referred to racial discrimination and given concrete examples of the behaviour troubling her. This is arguably the most useful lesson in the case for employers.
Many managers still assume that legal protections only begin once something arrives labelled a formal grievance. This case shows that is not the position. Managers need to be trained to recognise when a discrimination allegation is being raised conversationally, including where the employee does not use legal terminology or says they do not want to make a formal complaint, and to understand that once such a concern has been raised, subsequent decisions affecting that employee need clear and genuine reasons capable of being evidenced later. There is a related point about information flow. A number of the alleged victimisation acts failed here because the individuals involved simply did not know about the protected act. That is not a reason to build deliberate information barriers as a form of defence, but it does underline the value of sharing complaints on a genuine need-to-know basis, handling confidentiality carefully, and keeping a clear record of who was told what and when.
Do not let informal concerns disappear between systems
The judgment was not entirely uncritical of Kier. Ms Reeves had earlier posted on the company’s racial inclusion network describing feelings of isolation, and the Head of HR offered to connect her with the wider network. The tribunal found no evidence that this offer was ever followed through, and described the failure as unexplained. It is a useful reminder that employees raise concerns through many different channels, whether an inclusion network, a passing conversation, a message to a manager or a formal grievance, and that a sophisticated policy framework offers limited protection if individual concerns are left to fall between HR, line management and internal networks without anyone owning the follow-up.
The wider legal picture is changing quickly
The case did not concern third-party harassment, but employers reading it in isolation risk missing an important deadline. From 30th October 2026, two related but distinct changes take effect under the Employment Rights Act 2025. The existing duty to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment becomes a duty to take all reasonable steps. Employers will also face liability for harassment by third parties such as customers, clients and contractors where they have failed to take all reasonable steps to prevent it. That protection extends beyond sexual harassment to harassment related to protected characteristics covered by section 26, including race. There is no requirement to wait for repeated third-party incidents before liability can arise. A first incident can potentially give rise to a claim where it meets the statutory harassment test and the employer cannot show it took all reasonable steps to prevent it.
What this means in practice
For employers, the practical starting point is to take informal concerns seriously rather than waiting for the words “grievance” or “complaint” to appear before considering potential victimisation risk. Where a concern is raised, it is worth agreeing early what the employee wants to happen next, while being honest that confidentiality has limits and that the seriousness of an allegation may require action regardless of the individual’s wishes. Depending on the seriousness of the allegation and the wider risk, a proportionate response might include a targeted reminder, management intervention or refresher training without identifying the complainant.
In other cases, the employer may need to investigate more formally even where that is not what the employee initially wants. Where an employee is off sick, welfare support and the investigation need to run alongside each other rather than one being abandoned in favour of the other, with flexibility on meeting format, location and representation where that helps.
Ordinary management decisions taken after a complaint, whether about duties, reporting lines, performance or contractual details, are worth documenting with their genuine business rationale at the time, since they can look very different in hindsight once a protected act is in the picture.
Finally, with the 30th October 2026 deadline approaching, employers should be identifying which roles involve regular contact with customers, clients, contractors or the public, assessing where third-party harassment is reasonably foreseeable, and reviewing whether their risk assessments, policies, training, contractual protections and reporting routes amount to all the reasonable preventative steps available to them.
Reeves v Kier is not really a case about whether one phrase was lawful. It is a case about how quickly an informal concern can acquire legal significance, how much a genuinely engaged response can do to manage that risk, and how little comfort a favourable tribunal outcome should give an employer thinking about the standard it wants to set going forward.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
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