Olivia Burke
A man who spent 15 years on the sick before suing his employer for not giving him a pay rise insisted he was 'not greedy'.
Ian Clifford was working for the International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) when he was forced to take time off work due to his health in September 2008.
The 50-year-old claimed he was initially signed off on mental health grounds, before he was later diagnosed with stage four leukaemia in 2012.
On his LinkedIn profile, Clifford stated that he was ‘medically retired’ from 2013.
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The same year, he raised a grievance with the tech giant as he claimed he had not received a pay rise or any holiday pay over the five-year period he had been out of work.
Clifford managed to reach a ‘compromise agreement’ with his employer and he was put onto its disability plan which prevented him from being dismissed, meaning that he remained an IBM employee, but he had 'no obligation to work'.
Under this health plan, workers have the right to earn three-quarters of their agreed earnings and Clifford was supposed to receive an annual salary of £54,028 until he turned 65.
This would mean he would have earned about £1.5 million during his years on sick leave - but as IBM has not reviewed his wages since 2013, Clifford launched a legal battle against the firm in February 2022.
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He took the US-based firm to an employment tribunal on claims of disability discrimination, with a grievance similar to his initial submission.
The senior IT worker said he had been treated 'unfavourably' as he'd received no salary increase since 2013 and complained that the 'value of the payments would soon wither' due to punishingly high levels of inflation.
He said: "The point of the plan was to give security to employees not able to work - that was not achieved if payments were forever frozen."
But the employment tribunal in Reading dismissed his claim, telling the dad that he was getting a 'very substantial benefit' and receiving 'favourable treatment'.
Speaking of his motivations for the legal dispute, Clifford previously said he reckons it's 'highly unlikely' that he will live past the age of 65.
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He had hoped that the funds from his employer would allow him to make sure his son was taken care of as he 'used all his savings' on the case.
Clifford told The Telegraph in 2023: "I am on chemotherapy and have been for many years and have been extremely unwell.
"Your salary affects your debt service, pension and everything else, it was more for my family.
"People may think, yes, it's generous, but firstly those amounts are gross not taxed. I do pay national insurance on those amounts.
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"I have a son [who is] off to university. Your mortgage doesn't go down because you are sick.
"I had to use all my savings to bring this case and more and had to borrow money on a credit card… it's left me financially very vulnerable."
Clifford said he was aware people would 'still think its greedy', however, he believed he was entitled to more cash as 'that was a benefit he got with the job'.
Despite launching a legal battle against IBM, he explained he had always considered himself as a 'company man'.
Employment Judge Paul Housego, who dismissed the case, told Clifford 'it is not disability discrimination that the plan is not even more generous' than he wanted.
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"Even if the value of the £50,000 a year halved over 30 years, it is still a very substantial benefit," Judge Housego said.