An employment judge has ruled that calling someone a 'dark horse' is not racist, after a black worker tried to sue her employer when her boss used the phrase.
Jim Shepherd at The Leeds Employment Tribunal said that the much-used phrase refers to someone or something having hidden talents and achieving success unexpectedly.
There was no reason therefore that it should be considered racially offensive, the tribunal said.
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Grace Mangwanya, a support assistant, had tried to sue her place of work, the Leeds Citizens Advice Bureau in Leeds, for race discrimination and race harassment. She complained that her manager used the phrase 'dark horse' in front of her, but she had 'misunderstood' what the expression meant when she took offence to it.
After she lost her job she brought several allegations against the Bureau but her claims, including the 'dark horse' allegation, were thrown out. The phrase 'dark horse' has an illustrious pedigree and was penned by none other than author and ex-Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli in his 1831 novel The Young Duke.
The novel's protagonist witnessed a horse race that had a surprise winner, a dark horse 'which had never been thought of'. The hearing heard Ms Mangwanya was employed by Citizens Advice in September 2019 on a one-year fixed-term contract in its scams department.
Problems arose when the phrase 'dark horse' was said by a service support manager in relation to a conversation about ex-Chelsea footballer Didier Drogba. In June 2020 Ms Mangwanya wrote: "Today (a colleague), mentioned that she knows Didier Drogba because he is from Ivory Coast and was a friend of her last boyfriend was from Ivory Coast.
'(The manager) then said, "(The colleague) I did not know that you were sort of the dark horse person", meaning she had a black boyfriend. '(The colleague) avoided answering this. I am now very sure that she is not aware that it offends others. Can we genuinely talk (as) humans, as a black person, some of the things she says are painful in our culture.'
In her email, she also complained two months before the dark horse comment that the manager 'came in wearing a black African wig and glasses as a joke'.
Judge Shepherd said: "This remark was addressed to one of Ms Mangwanya's colleagues who raised no objection at the time. Ms Mangwanya misunderstood the reference to a dark horse which refers to someone who has kept their talents hidden, a horseracing metaphor.
"It was not harassment as it did not have the purpose or effect of violating her dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for her."
The tribunal also heard that the manager did not wear an African wig but simply a "messy hippy style" wig with 'Diamante glasses' as part of an online quiz to be "lighthearted and entertaining." She put on the wig at the start "to show her funny side."
Her other claims of race discrimination, race harassment, disability discrimination, victimisation, and religious discrimination were also dismissed. He concluded: "Her case was very difficult to follow. The evidence she gave was often incoherent.
"She failed to answer questions put to her in cross-examination on numerous occasions and resorted to taking an exceptional length of time finding documents which did not assist her and she then tended to mutter and state that (Citizens Advice) is a racist organisation.
"Her approach was to attack Citizens Advice and its witnesses but not to go through the issues or put the allegations in any clear form. This has been an extraordinarily lengthy and wearing case for all those involved.
"The Tribunal has sympathy for everyone in the case, particularly those employees who have been subject to unfounded serious allegations of discrimination. Ms Mangwanya provided a litany of allegations.
"It is clear that she views every difficulty, or perceived difficulty, she faced during her employment through the lens of discrimination whether race, disability or religion or belief."
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