Successor Not Comparator

One of the commonly disputed issues in equal pay claims is who is an appropriate comparator for the purposes of deciding if an employer's pay policy has been applied in a discriminatory fashion.

Recently, a claimant sought to use as a comparator a successor to the post, as opposed to a contemporary. The Employment Appeal Tribunal rejected the use of a successor as a comparator as being too hypothetical. Elias P said that the Equal Pay Act "plainly envisages comparison with someone employed at the same time as the claimant."