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Asda shopworkers’ long-running legal battle to receive pay equal to their colleagues who work in the supermarket’s warehouses is being considered in a virtual hearing that got underway at Britain’s supreme court on Monday.
About 35,000 retail workers, who are mostly women, have filed claims asking to be paid the same as the predominantly male staff who work in the chain’s distribution depots, and who receive a higher wage.
The retailer is asking five justices of the UK’s highest court to overturn earlier rulings, including a 2019 verdict by the court of appeal, which found in favour of the shopworkers and said that they could compare themselves to the higher-paid depot workers.
Asda, which is owned by US retailer Walmart, does not believe that the retail workers are entitled to compare themselves with higher-paid warehouse workers.
The case is the biggest equal pay claim ever seen in the UK private sector, and is being heard over two days with the justices listening to the arguments over video.
The justices are not expected to deliver a ruling until later in the year.
Lord Pannick QC, who is leading Asda’s legal team, told the justices that the case depended on whether the store workers were “in the same employment” as workers at the firm’s distribution depots.
“Asda submits that the answer is no,” Pannick said in a written case outline.
Pannick said that the terms and conditions of the workers’ employment depended on the “establishment” in which they work.
“The different types of establishment operate in different geographical locations, in different industries and with different pay-setting processes,” Pannick said.
The Asda employees are being represented by law firm Leigh Day, who were instructed by the GMB union.
The workers are hopeful that they will win the fight, said Lauren Lougheed, a specialist in employment law at Leigh Day, and want to “prove once and for all that the roles are comparable”.
If the workers are successful, they are seeking six years’ of backdated pay from the retailer.
However even if the Supreme Court justices rule in the workers’ favour, Leigh Day lawyers say their battle for equal pay will not end, as the shop employees will still have to show that the retail and distribution roles are of equal value.
The workers’ dispute with Asda is seen as a landmark case, and the outcome will have repercussions for about 8,000 workers at other UK supermarkets including Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Co-op and Morrisons, who are also engaged in equal pay disputes with their employers.
Leigh Day has said that if the five supermarkets lose the cases brought by their workers, they could be facing backdated pay claims totalling £8bn.
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