City lawyer's breast cancer 'lie'

A City lawyer claiming £19m in damages for sexual discrimination led her previous employers to believe she had breast cancer, a tribunal has heard.

Gill Switalski, 51, of Surrey, said she had not corrected the assumption as she was ashamed to admit she was bipolar.

She also admitted attending a job interview while on sick leave.

F&C Assets Management wants earlier rulings that she was sexually discriminated against and harassed to be reassessed as she had lied.

Sick leave

Documents submitted by the firm's lawyers claimed Ms Switalski had applied for other jobs and accepted an offer from Royal London in November 2006.

They claimed she had attended the interview while on sick leave.

Ms Switalski had told the earlier tribunal she had been unable to work after leaving her £140,000 job at F&C in September 2007.

She told Tuesday's hearing that in a previous conversation with Sonya Rayner, who recruited her for the Royal London job, she had mentioned she had been recalled for a scan and had had breast tissue removed.

I told her what I had been diagnosed with there wasn't a cure for Gill Switalski

Ms Switalski: "I told her what I had been diagnosed with there wasn't a cure for. It's true, there isn't a cure for bipolar. I didn't say it was bipolar.

"It was pretty clear the conclusion she had come to. I felt ashamed because I couldn't tell her the truth that I was bipolar."

Ms Switalski was questioned on why she had not told the earlier tribunal about the job offer from Royal London, which she accepted then later turned down claiming she was too ill.

In response she said: "I was diagnosed as mentally ill. I would have had to undergo a medical.

"You are making out that I have invented something to get some money when this company (F&C) has crushed me into the ground."

Lawyers for F&C Assets Management also said Ms Switalski had tried to "bolster" her own prospects in order to gain a greater compensation payout.

Ms Switalski said: "I'm not interested in the numbers. I don't want anyone to go through what I did where a company pretends they care about employees then puts them through the wringer."