A mixed-race recruitment consultant has won more than £12,000 after a manager told her she looks ‘like an alien from the Avatar movie’ because of her braids.
Jasmine Fubara was left ‘shocked’ when she was told by a manager during her interview that she looked like one of the blue, CGI-generated characters from the hit 2009 James Cameron movie, an employment tribunal heard.
Ms Fubara, who also models, found the remark about her braids ‘demeaning’ but said she was willing to let it slide as a ‘one-off error’.
However, after she joined the recruitment group, she was subjected to a series of racially insensitive comments – including one colleague asking if she was listening to ‘ghetto music’.
She was eventually sacked by Certus Recruitment Group, based in London, days before she was due to be paid over £2,000 in commission, the tribunal heard.
Now, she has successfully sued the company for race harassment with the tribunal ruling the firm had a ‘toxic environment’ and ordering it to pay Ms Fubara £12,515 in compensation.
The hearing in central London was told Ms Fubara joined Certus Recruitment as a candidate consultant in March 2022 before being dismissed in September 2022.
Ms Fubara, who represented herself at the tribunal, claimed that she was subject to a number of incidents during her time there.
‘(Certus Recruitment Group) accepts that at an early interview, (a manager) made a comment about (Ms Fubara’s) hair, that it looked like a character from the film Avatar,’ the tribunal said.
The movie – which stars Sigourney Weaver and Zoe Saldana is the highest grossing film of all time making almost $3 billion at the box office.
The tribunal heard that the manager claimed he made the ‘friendly’ Avatar comment because she had a long ponytail.
The judgement stated: ‘(Certus Recruitment Group)’s case to (Ms Fubara) is that Avatars are blue, the comment ‘was not representative of race’.
‘(Ms Fubara’s) evidence, which we accepted, was that she was shocked by this comment, which she believed was clearly related to race; their skin colour ‘is not their only feature, they are cartoons who have long braids and hairstyles which resonate with black culture’.
The panel did not accept the company’s position that because Ms Fubara ‘continued in the interview process and took the role she did not believe it was related to race.’
The hearing was told that on another occasion in July 2022, she the employee was working with earphones in when she was asked by a department head whether she was listening to ‘Ghetto music’.
Cerus ‘argumentative’ CEO Justin Byrne surprised the tribunal by saying that when he was growing up, the word ghetto ‘was for him only associated with tape decks’, as in ghetto-blasters.
The CEO did however accept Ms Fubara’s characterisation that ghetto is ‘pejorative and can be a racial stereotype’.
Ms Fubara overheard another colleague, Duncan Simmons, in August 2022 saying that they should not bother contacting candidates with non-English names as it would probably be a waste of time, the tribunal heard.
He denied that he said this, claiming that probably 50 per cent of his placed candidates were foreign nationals, and that he had left a previous agency because of racism and homophobia.
The tribunal found that comments like this contributed to the ‘hostile workplace’ environment for Ms Fubara.
Ms Fubara’s claims of race harassment and unauthorised deductions from wages of commission payments were upheld by the tribunal.
Ms Fubara is currently working as a receptionist, according to her LinkedIn profile. She was not at home yesterday, but her father told how proud he was of his daughter for standing up to her bosses after following the tribunal proceedings on Zoom with her.
Speaking at the family’s £2million terraced home in leafy Muswell Hill, North London, Reg Fubara said: ‘I just felt so sorry for her – it pretty upsetting.
‘In the beginning, she thought she’d done something wrong, and I said to her, ‘no, no, this is not normal at all.’
He added: ‘For my daughter, growing up in this diverse neighbourhood, it was a shock to hear those things – especially in London.
‘And it was like, you know, her first job. So this is the first time she was in a work environment. ‘It was so consistent. Some people just don’t know how racist they are.’
He said the 24-year-old Sheffield Hallam University graduate now had another job but was hoping to set up her own business.
Employment Judge Mark Emery said the Avatar comment was not intended as an offensive remark and was ‘brushed off’ by Ms Fubara ‘as a clumsy one-off comment’.
But the judge added: ‘While that a one-off act may not in itself be an act of harassment, we can take into account the cumulative effect of the comments made to (Ms Fubara).
‘We accept that (Ms Fubara) was entitled to look back and see this comment as part of a chain of casualised and derogatory comments which were related to race.’
Judge Emery added: ‘We accept that the harassment was not deliberate, but there was a culture issue within (Certus Recruitment Group) which caused (Ms Fubara) distress throughout her employment.
‘While not deliberate or concerted, the harassment was more than intermittent to the extent (Ms Fubara) lost confidence in her professional abilities.
‘We also take into account the lack of an apology for her treatment, instead… the argument was that (Ms Fubara) had lied throughout her evidence.
‘An apology genuinely given can assist with recovery from injury and the lack of an apology is a factor we have taken into account in assessing the injury caused.’
Ms Fubara lost claims of disability discrimination and sick pay deductions.