Nobody gets to weigh what you can do against what you can’t, not even a tribunal
“EATStands for Employment Appeal Tribunal. It hears appeals from employment tribunal decisions on points of law, not on the facts. It is not a way of simply asking for a second opinion on the outcome. overturned the tribunal, ruling his ADHD and autism could still meet the disability test.”
A diagnosis is real evidence your impairment is substantial. You shouldn't have to prove that all over again.
- One difficulty is enough. Your whole life doesn't have to be affected, just one day-to-day activity, more than trivially.
- Your strengths don't cancel out your struggles. Nobody gets to weigh what you're good at against what you find hard.
- The comparison is with you, not with everyone else. Tribunals ask how you'd function without the impairment, not whether you're worse off than the general population.
- If a job offer or a workplace process turns on whether you count as disabled, this case gives you the test to hold them to.
The situation
A job applicant disclosed ADHD and autism when he applied for an Animation Host role at a UK holiday park operator. His application was unsuccessful, and he took a disability discrimination claim to tribunal. At a preliminary hearing, the tribunal accepted he had ADHD and autism. It ruled the conditions didn't reach the legal bar of "substantial" anyway. That ruling meant his case could go no further.
What the tribunal found
The original tribunal set his difficulties, forming friendships, using crowded public transport, remembering things, concentrating, talking to colleagues and customers, against what he could do. He performed in public. He'd completed a degree. He visited friends. On that balance, the tribunal decided nothing here counted as "substantial".
The Employment Appeal Tribunal said that's the wrong test. One activity being more than trivially affected is enough on its own. A tribunal can't weigh what someone struggles with against what they manage well, not for one activity, not overall. The real comparison is between the person as they are and as they'd be without the impairment, not against people generally.
The EAT went further. A clinical diagnosis matters for more than proving an impairment exists. A clinician has already judged that the person's functioning differs meaningfully from the norm, and a tribunal has to treat that as evidence the effect is substantial too. The case went back to a fresh tribunal to be decided properly.
For the fuller legal test behind this, see our guide on what the law actually protects if you're neurodivergent.
Stedman v Haven Leisure Ltd. Case No. EA-2024-000095-LA. Employment Appeal Tribunal. 16 June 2025.