Endometriosis and Structural Discrimination in the Workplace with Elaine Banton

About this episode

Isobelle speaks with Elaine Banton about endometriosis, workplace discrimination, and the impact of structural issues on individuals with chronic conditions.

In this episode, Isobelle speaks to Elaine Banton, a barrister at 7BR Chambers specialising in employment, equality and discrimination. The discussion begins with a discussion of Elaine’s recent appellate success in the case Pal v Accenture. This case tackled disability discrimination and workplace progression systems, leading us into a broader consideration on how workplace models are frequently hostile and unaccommodating to those experiencing endometriosis and other chronic conditions. Elaine emphasises how these existing frameworks frequently lead to structural problems becoming individualised.   We also discuss endometriosis more generally in this episode, talking about ‘medical misogyny’, and why women’s pain is so often normalised or dismissed, and what approaches may be taken to address and change this. The discussion concludes with a reflection on AI biases in government decisions and the importance of building guardrails and fairness into systems proactively rather than retroactively addressing harms. Directly pertaining to the discussion in the episode, a recent petition, created by Sanju Pal, has called for gynaecological conditions to be listed as…

People in this episode

Host: Isobelle

Guest: Elaine Banton

Topics covered

• endometriosis
• disability discrimination
• workplace progression
• medical misogyny
• chronic conditions
• AI biases
• structural discrimination

Keywords

• endometriosis
• disability discrimination
• workplace models
• medical misogyny
• chronic conditions
• AI biases
• Equality Act 2010

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: 7BR Chambers, Accenture, Equality Act 2010

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