Equality officer claims weight discrimination by insurance firm

LIFE assurer Eagle Star wants the High Court to stop the Equality Tribunal case of an equality officer who claims her income protection policy was 100% loaded because she was overweight.

Bernadette Treanor, a senior civil servant working as an equality officer, has claimed the insurer had insinuated to others in 2002 that her policy had been loaded because she was overweight and for “other incorrect reasons”. As Ms Treanor is an equality officer, the Equality Tribunal assigned an external equality officer to investigate and decide the case.

In 2002, Ms Treanor, aged 49, of Dowdallshill, Newry Road, Dundalk, Co Louth, alleged discrimination on grounds of “disability” and claimed the loading decision was based on “medical information” which was “no longer relevant”.