Banker's bonus cut after pregnancy

A high-flying banker had her annual bonus slashed by more than 80 per cent after telling City bosses she was pregnant, an industrial tribunal heard today.

Her promised 2001 bonus was slashed from £175,000 to £31,000. Even though boss Paul Hearne sent emails telling her 'You are on a roll' and 'Keep 'em coming regarding deals,' her bonus fell while those of male colleagues rose to an average £287,000, she told Woburn Place Employment Tribunal.

The mother-of-two claimed she was shifted to a different division and given poor clients after she first returned from maternity leave in May 2000. She said when she returned from her second maternity leave in November 2002 her post in Northern Europe Financial Institutions Group had been made a jobshare and the bank tried to "freeze" her out. She told the tribunal: "This was a fundamental change to my job function - a breach of contract, humiliating, offensive. It amounted to a deliberate undermining of my position and would have been recognised as such by other staff members and clients.

"It is my belief that it was still the bank's intention to make my position on my return from maternity leave untenable in the hope that I would leave the bank and they could revert to the one person they wanted in that role."

Mrs McGregor-Mezzotero claims sexual discrimination, saying she was denied equal pay, and also alleges nonpayment of wages - charges denied by BNP Paribas.

She said: "The £175,000 bonus I had been on in mid-2001 was eventually reduced by over 80 per cent after the bank's discovery I was pregnant." The tribunal heard how the banker was headhunted to join BNP Capital Markets Ltd in 1996 and achieved a discretionary bonus of £200,000 for her work in 1999.

In May 2000 she returned to work at newly merged BNP Paribas, but was told she had no alternative but to work in Northern Europe Financial Institutions Group - an unfamiliar area.

She was given "left-over clients", which "had an adverse effect on my ability to make the client contribution", she said. That year she received a bonus of £125,000 while male colleagues allegedly received an average of £205,000.

In July 2001 Mrs McGregor-Mezzotero was told she could expect a discretionary bonus of £175,000 but after telling her bosses she was pregnant for the second time this allegedly plumetted to £31,000. After returning from maternity leave in November 2002, she was expected to share her original job because colleague Chris Babington, who had taken over in her absence, had "done so well".

She claimed it was like a "slap in the face" when she was not allowed to pitch an idea that she had had before going on maternity leave.

Mrs McGregor-Mezzotero, of Chingford, who still works at BNP Paribas, said she felt insulted after being told by colleague Peter Van der Velden in Amsterdam, after a warning that market conditions were tough: "You should have stayed on maternity leave for another nine months. Actually you should get pregnant again."

She added: "I was now feeling abandoned and humiliated by the bank. I couldn't understand why the bank was treating me in this way.

"Was it because I was now a mother with two children? There seemed no other viable explanation."

The tribunal, due to last another two weeks, continues.