An employer has been told to pay more than £26,000 to a former worker for deliberately coughing in her face during the Covid pandemic.
Kevin Davies – the father of the Wales rugby player Gareth Davies – set out to “ridicule and intimidate” the woman over her health concerns, a tribunal heard.
Davies, 62, mocked the employee of his car sales and property business in the days before lockdown after she expressed her health fears to colleagues.
The woman had asked fellow workers at Cawdor Cars to socially distance from her – as was recommended by officials – because she suffered from psoriatic arthritis and an autoimmune condition.
The employment judge Tobias Vincent Ryan said Davies “coughed in her direction deliberately and loudly, commenting that she was being ridiculous”. Judge Ryan said Davies set out to “ridicule and intimidate” the woman with his “gross behaviour” on 17 March 2020 – a week before the first lockdown was announced.
The hearing was told the woman had worked for Cawdor Cars in Newcastle Emlyn, west Wales, between 2017 and 2020 and earned £11 an hour. The company has six branches across south and west Wales. It also has a property rental section where she worked as a property manager for its portfolio, including hotels and housing developments.
Judge Ryan found other members of the firm’s management team overheard the coughing incident, but he said when called to give evidence in the tribunal they came across “defensively and as not being wholly straightforward”.
The tribunal heard the woman complained “vehemently” about the coughing incident and resigned from the business less than three months later.
Ryan said: “She resigned at least in part because she was victimised; this was a major and significant factor in her decision. She felt that she was being eased out partly because of her complaints. She was correct.”
The judge ordered that the woman receive a payout of £26,438.84 – with Cawdor Cars handing her £18,000 in damages for injury to feelings and Davies paying £3,841.94 for unfair dismissal and £4,596.90 in interest.
Speaking after the hearing, the woman said she was left a “nervous wreck” after Davies’ “horrendous” conduct. She said: “He knew of my medical condition. He knew I had no immune protection because of the medication I had to take, and he deliberately coughed in my face. I was shaking. I’m not a silly, fluffy person – I’ve had to put up with a lot in my life – but it really got me.”
Davies’ son Gareth is nicknamed Gareth Cawdor over his connections to his father’s business. He has 77 international caps for Wales and has twice toured with the British and Irish Lions.
