Teaching Assistant Loses Religious Discrimination Lawsuit Over Christmas Grinch Award

A Muslim teaching assistant who claimed that presenting the Christmas Grinch award at a staff awards ceremony amounted to religious discrimination has lost his employment tribunal case.

Salah Toughfar said he was “angry and saddened” by the treatment Dr. Seuss character – even though he knew nothing about the mean creature until a colleague showed him a Wikipedia description.

The teaching assistant later complained that the audience laughed at him when he accepted his trophy, but a court rejected his claim, saying the reception he received was no different than that of the other winners.

His allegations of direct discrimination and harassment related to his religion were dismissed.

The Grinch is best known as the main character in the 1957 children's book How the Grinch Stole Christmas and was portrayed in a 2000 film by Jim Carrey.

Mr Toughfar, a practicing Muslim from Morocco, started working at Grove School in north London in April 2020, an employment tribunal heard.

The school, run by the Search Education Trust, is a specialist free school for pupils aged five to 19 with a primary diagnosis of autism and is “diverse” with pupils and staff from all backgrounds, the Watford tribunal heard.

The learning support assistant, who still works at the school, told the court that as part of his job he took part in Christmas activities at the school, such as putting up decorations in class, but would not host a Christmas dinner.

The court heard that in December 2022, deputy headteacher Daniel McKay Wood began compiling a list of award categories for the graduation awards and decided on a Christmas theme.

The court was told that Mr Toughfar, who was represented at the hearing by his wife, had previously received the Prankster Award but had not raised any issue about it at the time.

According to a Google search, holiday award categories included “The Rudolph,” “Santa's Little Helper,” “The Hardest Working Elf,” “The Abominable Snowman” and “The Christmas Grinch.”

Mr McKay Wood, who is not a Christian, did not believe the awards had a religious connotation, the court heard.

He prepared an online vote and invited employees to cast their votes.

Mr Toughfar received four votes for the Christmas Grinch Award, while two other employees received three votes each, the court was told.

He told the tribunal that he believed Mr McKay Wood set his own voting deadline without telling anyone, which is why the award went to him because he was Muslim.

In a “light-hearted and joyful” awards ceremony, Mr Toughfar was named winner of the Christmas Grinch award and went upstairs to accept a miniature Oscar statue as a trophy, the court was told.

He told the court he knew nothing about the character and asked a colleague who showed him pictures and a description on her phone, which left him “upset and distressed”.

He later held a meeting with a senior member of staff where he returned his trophy and claimed the award represented bullying and discrimination, the court heard.

In an email to a school human resources manager, he said: “I have never seen a workplace, let alone a school, present such an unkind and inappropriate trophy to an employee.”

“I don’t understand how such a decision to give someone a trophy representing that character can be allowed. This essentially encourages bullying in front of all school staff and is an act of bullying and discrimination.”

Judge Dilbaag Bansal said Mr Toughfar had “produced no evidence to show that his receiving the Christmas Grinch Award was either due to or related to his religion”.

“The court was satisfied that he received the Christmas Grinch Award because he had received the most votes at the time voting closed.”