Mother files protest over dismissal in pregnancy

A lawyer claiming her pregnancy led to her dismissal in 2010 has filed a judicial protest against her former employers giving them one week to issue compensation.

Anika Psaila Savona, 41, is seeking damages for “illegal behaviour” and has taken action against Corinthia Group chairman Alfred Pisani, CHI chief executive Tony Potter, CHI Limited, IHI plc, and Corinthia Palace Hotel Company Plc.

“Individuals are also responsible for their actions and should not be able to hide behind a company,” she says, explaining why she also filed the protest against Mr Pisani and Mr Potter.

When contacted, Mr Pisani’s lawyer would only say the company was preparing a reply and would be filing a counter protest in due course.

Employed as a senior executive with Corinthia Group for nine years, Dr Psaila Savona was working as a lawyer with CHI when she received a letter on January 8, 2010, terminating her employment – six months into herpregnancy.

Dr Psaila Savona took her case to the Industrial Tribunal – but two years on, seven sittings later and with two babies in tow, the case has made little progress.

She laments that the case is still at the preliminary stages as the tribunal attempts to establish whether it has jurisdiction due to the company’s claim that Dr Psaila Savona was employed as a consultant and was not an employee.

Dr Psaila Savona confirmed that after being on a full-time contract for nearly seven years, the contract signed in 2007 was entitled ‘consultancy agreement’, but for all intents and purposes she was treated as an employee.

She concedes that while as a lawyer she was aware of the risk she was being exposed to, she felt pressured into signing because she feared not doing so would be deemed lack of trust in her new CEO who had verbally promised to put her back on the payroll.

She had been trying to negotiate her indefinite part-time contract since July 2009, but whenshe informed the company of her pregnancy the discussions stopped. She was then let gowithout warning.

When the story had first surfaced in The Sunday Times two years ago, Corinthia had denied Dr Psaila Savona’s claims, describing her accusations as “false”. The company added it would be addressing the matter in court.

Looking back on the case, Dr Psaila Savona believes the debate over whether she was an employee or a consultant became irrelevant in the light of aEuropean Court of Justice ruling, Dita Danosa vs LKB Lízings SIA, in November 2010.

Dr Anika Psaila Savona insists the ECJ case makes such discussions irrelevant as it confirms that “a worker” under EU directives is interpreted in the widest form.

“All that is necessary to prove is subordination, which I can; the formal categorisation of a contract is not important,” she says.

Dr Psaila Savona said she had decided to fight back and take on Corinthia, a big international hotel chain, to set an example to those in a similar predicament and ensure women’s rights are not trampled upon.

“I sympathise with younger women who are in a similarsituation but don’t have the resources to take on employers who have treated them unfairly or are too scared to be blacklisted as a troublemaker,” she said.

“There is a form of reluctance when taking on a company as powerful as Corinthia as their reach is broad and future employment prospects could be prejudiced,” she said.

“What has been difficult is that at a society level, certain people have distanced themselves from us, preferring I did nothing and maintained the status quo... By losing my job in my prime, the government has lost out too as my contributions to its coffers are now significantly less.”