May I make a comment on Bazzaman's posting where it is stated "Surely the question here isn't whether it is safe or unsafe, but whether it is safe to the standards of safety that BA requires"
It reminds me of another avialtion case Alidair Ltd v Taylor 1978 IRLR 82 CA where the Court of Appeal stressed that what was important was the genuine belief of the employer. Perhaps BA should have made use of this fact earleir in the exercise.
Reading the developing saga of Ms Starmer (in the 35 page version) I was rather uncomfortable at the failure of posters to stress the safety issue. There was , I seem to recall, mention that trainers fly few hours.
However, as a passenger I would be happier flying with a trainer who. one has to assume, has learnt the skills, experienced the problems and knows the answers.
I appreciate they may be exceptions to this rule but as a passenger I would be concerned about the ability of this lady to deal as effectively with an emergency as someone who started the same time as she did but have accumumlated the hours of experience that usually bring increased skills.
The outcome of this case will be (or should be) that airlines will carry out an exercise that anticipates requests from both sexes to fly or work shorter hours. The exercise should that form the basis of a response to the employee rather than a shoot from the hip type denial of the request which leads to trouble at the tribunal.