Corp-Ethics.com - Report: Wal-Mart bias case to go to trial

Company	Wal-Mart [Company Info]
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Date	Issue	Title
6th Feb 2007	Questionable Practice	Wal-Mart bias case to go to trial

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Wal-Mart will face a lawsuit claiming pay discrimination against more than a million female US employees after a court approved the action.

A federal appeals court upheld a 2004 ruling giving the lawsuit class action status, sanctioning claims from up to 1.5 million current and former staff.

Should it lose the case, the world's largest retailer could have to pay damages worth billions of dollars.

Wal-Mart has said it did not have a policy discriminating against women.

The world's largest retailer said it would appeal against the verdict.

The original lawsuit was filed in 2001 by six women who either worked for Wal-Mart or had done so in the past.

A lawyer representing the women said they had "been waiting years for this decision".

In a split two-to-one verdict, the San Francisco court ruled that the country's largest class action lawsuit against a private employer could proceed.

Judge Martin Jenkins said sufficient evidence existed of discriminatory practices dating back to 1998 to support the case going to trial.

"Factual evidence, statistical evidence and anecdotal evidence present significant proof of a corporate policy of discrimination and support plaintiff's contention that female employees nationwide were subjected to a common pattern and practice of discrimination," he said.

But in his dissenting opinion, Judge Andrew Kleinfeld said the only evidence of discrimination provided was the fact that the number of female managers at Wal-Mart stores was disproportionately lower than the total number of female staff.

"This case poses a considerable risk of enriching undeserving class members and counsel, but depriving thousands of women actually injured by sex discrimination of their just due," he argued.

Whatever the outcome of Wal-Mart's appeal, the case - first heard in 2003 - is unlikely to come to trial for some time.

The lawsuit only applies to women employed by Wal-Mart since 26 December 1998.

At any future trial, the plaintiffs will need to establish that Wal-Mart had a company-wide policy of paying female staff less than men and that workers had no right to argue their individual cases.

Lawyer Brad Seligman, who is representing the women who brought the case, said the merits of the case had now been recognised twice.

"We fully expect Wal-Mart to keep appealing but we are very confident now that two courts have upheld this certification," he said.

Wal-Mart has argued that granting the lawsuit class action status is inappropriate because its 3,400 stores operate as individual businesses and that issues of pay and promotion are decided locally.

It said workers who believed they were victims of discrimination could sue individual stores.

Criticised in the past for poor employment practices, something which it has always denied, Wal-Mart has launched a host of diversity and environmental initiatives in recent years.

But last year the retailer was ordered to pay at least $78m in compensation to workers after a court found it had broken the law by not paying staff for working during breaks.

Other Reports on Wal-Mart
Date	Issue	Company	Report
13th Oct 2006	Questionable Practice	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart must pay workers $78m
8th Sep 2006	Other Issue	Wal-Mart	Sweden Blacklists Wal-Mart Stock Over Ethics
10th Apr 2006	Other Issue	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart bank application probed
23rd Dec 2005	Questionable Practice	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart must pay workers $172m
13th Sep 2005	Questionable Practice	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart hit by 'sweatshop' claim
18th Mar 2005	Other Issue	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart to pay immigrants fine
6th Jan 2005	Questionable Practice	Wal-Mart	Wal-Mart to pay $14m in gun suit

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