LONDON: A woman executive could receive a 2,50,000 pounds payout after winning a sexual discrimination case after she claimed she was sacked her for putting family before career.

Alison Prowse Piper, 40,was a 100,000 pounds-a-year manager tipped for a seat on the board of a 250 million pounds a year company until she took maternity leave. Her career at Anglian Home Improvements nosedived within days of revealing she was pregnant with her third child.

When her third child was born in 2006,14 months after her second baby, she returned to work for six months for marketing director Martin Troughton, who told her she was getting "boring", when she asked to be kept in the loop. He described her work as "pathetic" and held up her mobile phone in front of colleagues calling it a "useless brick".

Piper claimed she was excluded from important meetings, her pay was cut by more than 40,000 pounds and she was humiliated. When she complained of discrimination, she was made redundant. A new hearing will be held to settle compensation which is likely to amount to two or three times her salary.

Source : DNA