A Christian woman who was dismissed from her work at a Heathrow
airport beauty counter over claims she was "anti-Islam" is taking her
case to an employment appeal tribunal.
Nohad Halawi denies the accusation, which arose after a conversation
she had with a colleague, in which she described him as a "man of God",
was taken by another Muslim colleague to be a criticism of Islam.
She is being supported by the Christian Legal Centre, which says that
although the dispute was resolved by her manager, another Muslim
colleague started spreading false rumours that Mrs Halawi was
"anti-Islam".
This led to the management taking the decision to suspend and
withdraw her airside pass, which is required to work at the airport.
In June 2012 an employment tribunal ruled that as Mrs Halawi worked
at the beauty counter on a freelance basis, she was not a staff employee
and therefore had no employment rights, meaning she was unable to
challenge the grounds for her dismissal.
Mrs Halawi had been working at the beauty counter for over 10 years
before her dismissal and was paid by Caroline South Associates, which
supplies people to work in the airport's World Duty Free stores.
The Christian Legal Centre claims that Mrs Halawi was disadvantaged
throughout the investigation process and that her side of the story was
ignored by her managers.
In the past, Mrs Halawi has spoken of a campaign of 'race hate' by a
small number of 'extremist' colleagues who she claimed told her she
would go to Hell if she did not convert to Islam and left a Christian
colleague in tears after bullying her for wearing a cross necklace.
An Employment Appeal Tribunal is meeting in London today to rule on
whether Mrs Halawi has employment rights before she can go on to
challenge the nature of her dismissal.
Andrea Minichiello Williams, chief executive of Christian Legal
Centre, said: "The circumstances of Nohad's dismissal have got to be
challenged. In order for this to happen we need a recognition from the
judge that she has employment rights. Although at this point we are only dealing with the issue of
employment rights, there are bigger issues on the horizon. There is a
deference shown to Muslims in the workplace which is not shown to
Christians. Nohad was effectively dismissed on the basis of false claims against
her which were not properly dealt with or investigated. The nature of
the accusations also suggests that there is a security risk at Heathrow –
one of the biggest ports of entry into the UK. The case needs to
progress so that these issues can be dealt with."