Is it legal for your boss to make you wear a bra to work? by Poppy Noor

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/nov/12/is-it-legal-for-your-boss-to-make-you-wear-a-bra-to-work

Women

Is it legal for your boss to make you wear a bra to work?

Many women dislike wearing bras, but is it inappropriate to go without? A lawyer explains women’s rights

@PoppyNoor

Mon 12 Nov 2018 07.00 GMT

A woman on Netmums recently waded into a question many bra-wearing women have pondered: why am I wearing this?

Wade: (intr; foll by in or into) to attack energetically

In a post titled “Can I get in trouble for not wearing a bra at work?”, a contributor wrote that she finds bras uncomfortable. “I am not doing this for attention,” she wrote. “It’s 2018 – I shouldn’t have to wear something because it will make people feel less uncomfortable, stop men looking or just because it’s the norm.”

But what are women’s rights in this area? Can you really get sacked for not wearing a bra? According to Hayley Johnson, a senior associate in employment law for Slater and Gordon: “If someone was dismissed for not wearing a bra at work, that could be discriminatory under current law,” she says.

Some very conscientious Netmums users replied to the original post saying they were worried about the lasting effect on dress code policies if women could go braless willy-nilly. One suggested that people would go to work in the nude. But Johnson says any case would be treated with common sense: “If a woman came in wearing no bra and a see-through blouse, that could be a problem,” she says.

Willy-nilly: If something happens to you willy-nilly, it happens whether you like it or not.

While nipples shouldn’t be nefarious, employers can be. After Nicola Thorp, a receptionist at PricewaterhouseCoopers, lost a landmark case against the company – which sent her home for not wearing heels – the government issued guidance about dress codes. But Johnson argues that it’s not worth the paper it’s written on: “They said you should avoid distinguishing between what men and women can wear, rather than that you shouldn’t do it.”

Nefarious: If you describe an activity as nefarious, you mean that it is wicked and immoral.

Landmark: You can refer to an important stage in the development of something as a landmark.

It’s not worth the paper it’s written on : if something such as an agreement, promise or qualification is not worth the paper it's written on, it has no value, even if it seems official and definite.

Still, Johnson says she could take on the Netmums user’s case and win if the woman’s employee did make her wear a bra. “The basic rule is that if you’re requiring women to dress in a way that’s more onerous than if she were a man, it’s discrimination,” she says.

“If a man turned up without underwear and let you know he wasn’t wearing it, would he be sent home? I don’t think he would.”

Johnson points out that the TV presenter Richard Madeley has joked about not wearing pants to work: “It would be incredibly rare for a man to be sent home or disciplined for that. As a society, we need to wrap our heads around the fact that we shouldn’t place more onerous dress requirements on women, but that we still do.”