My disabled husband has been asked to return to the office.

[SuperstoreFan]

My husband has Cerebral Palsy and a severe hearing loss for which he wears hearing aids.

He's been WFH since March last year, his two yearly reviews since Covid-19 started have been very positive. In the last team meeting the manager sung his praises as he's been WFH with no fuss even after I gave birth to our first child in May.

His manager has requested that he returns to the office immediately and he's worried, mainly because he can't physically put on or remove a mask himself, he would need to get public transport to and from the office and he's reluctant to not wear a mask on the transport as he's worried about being confronted and physically he's vulnerable.

He's expected to wear a mask in the office as are the other few colleagues who are going back, even with his hearing aids he will still struggle massively as they only help his hearing so much and he's reliant on lip reading to understand what people are saying.

Has anyone got any advice? He's spoken to a friend who is a manager for another team and he's advised DH to speak to HR but he thinks that HR will protect the manager.

Can he request a risk assessment and reasonable adjustments?

Did he work there before the first lockdown?

Does his company have a Occupational Health department?

Surely he counts as exempt from mask wearing if he cannot physically put it on and remove it, so the company cannot force him to wear one in the office. He should also be able to get a reasonable adjustment for his colleagues to remove their masks when they speak to him to enable him to hear/ lip read. In terms of public transport, how does he travel around currently? I am mask exempt and haven't had anyone confront me about it, however I don't use public transport very often so haven't had to worry about that aside from the odd taxi- I presume a taxi to and from work each day would cost a lot more than the bus or train for your husband though.

Has he had the vaccine?

Yes he worked there three days a week previously (they want him back in five days a week), yes he's been jabbed twice, we use public transport at weekends and I help him put on and remove his mask every time we get transport or go in shops.

Why do they want him to do more days?

@DinosaurOfFire

Surely he counts as exempt from mask wearing if he cannot physically put it on and remove it, so the company cannot force him to wear one in the office. He should also be able to get a reasonable adjustment for his colleagues to remove their masks when they speak to him to enable him to hear/ lip read. In terms of public transport, how does he travel around currently? I am mask exempt and haven't had anyone confront me about it, however I don't use public transport very often so haven't had to worry about that aside from the odd taxi- I presume a taxi to and from work each day would cost a lot more than the bus or train for your husband though.

The company don't care, their policy is that masks must be worn. They haven't got a lot of physically disabled employees so I imagine that they've not given them any thought.

Taxi's would cost us £30 a day, that's far too much and even then it doesn''t solve the problem of getting a mask on before he gets in the office.

It does sound like the company is being a bit thoughtless and he should raise with his manager the concerns regarding lip reading.

With regards to the mask wearing, could he wear a visor or perhaps use an extra bit of elastic around the back of a fabric mask to mean he cn pull it over his head without having to fiddle with the ears?

@TheKeatingFive

Why do they want him to do more days?

No idea, not everyone has been called back, DH thinks that they want him back full time as there's more space to be used (they usually hotdesk).

Access to work might help with funding Taxis

Can you drop him off? I think companies are able to request people back on site now. If he's had the vaccine he should be ok. Could he request three days on site & two days wfh?

Ask for a referral to occupational health, speak to the manager about reasonable adjustments and contact Access to work who may fund taxis.

His work is being ridiculous in basically cutting him off by hearing anything with others wearing masks.

There’s good reason for him to be mask exempt, so I’d get him a doctors note on that and work will have to deal with it.

The visor / shield is a good idea

It’s irrelevant whether they have policies and procedures sin place - which they should of course for every entailing at work - as there are something called Laws and Legislation which they are bound by

Depending on his employment field d/ sector could he seek union advice or go through HR? His Line Manager has a sort of care and obligation to undertake any work related assessments etc

*Has a duty of care

Yes, suggests he makes a written request asap for ‘reasonable adjustments’ for his disability, in light of covid, and for these to be made before he returns to any office working. His request can propose specific adjustments, which his employer might or might not agree to, but they need to consider and outline reasoning/their alternative suggestions.

I would speak with ACAS, particularly if he feels he can't engage with HR at this stage

www.acas.org.uk/

Contact HR. This is an equality act issue. Insist on OH assessment, and until then reasonable adjustments (ideally continue WFH, which is a perfectly reasonable adjustment if he’s been doing it for so long with no issues).

He needs to contact his H&s officer and ask for a Risk Assessment. He can then go through what his day would look like from leaving home to returning. That will identify, objectively, where he needs adjustments. Then a conversation can be had about what's reasonable, viable etc.
He can self refer to Occ Health too.

Good luck.

It's all very well saying he's mask exempt so doesn't have to wear one but from what the op is saying he wants to wear one on public transport but isn't able to.

For example he could propose: full home working until govt removes the recommendation to wfh where possible (19 July), then 2 days a week in the office and 3 from home, and for colleagues to remove face masks in meetings with him, in order for him to be able to lip read.

It’s likely that there will be no requirement for facemasks on transport soon, and if there is transport operator guidance to do so he could wear an exemption lanyard.

The manager is being massively unreasonable but probably doesn’t understand how difficult it is for your DH. They probably also don’t realise that this is disability discrimination under the Equality Act.

This is the way to go with HR, that he can only return if they put in place the workplace adjustments he is entitled to (used to be called reasonable adjustments). They need to organise a workplace assessment and that will spell out what the adjustments need to be. It would most likely advise that he continues to WFH. His work performance from home has been good so it would be hard for them to argue otherwise.

I’d speak to acas then HR. And collect information because if his work standard fell as he can’t understand people while working in the office I expect the case for discrimination would be clear cut. He needs to do reasonable adjustments.
Incidentally, if he stays home how would he understand everyone , even on video screen they will have masks on in the office so is he going to struggle either way?

I’d be a bit surprised if access to work helped as surey theres a lot of demand and he can catch the train, just can’t put his mask on for it.

That is not a H&S risk assessment BTW, H&S would not normally do assessments for adjustments needed for people to do their work because of disability. These are HR/equality issues not safety. You need a specialist in disability - contacting Access to Work would be a starting point.