A former vice president at Goldman Sachs is suing the investment bank for £3.8 million ($5 million) in a sex-discrimination lawsuit. He claims that he was unfairly dismissed after taking six months of paternity leave.
Jonathan Reeves, who worked in Goldman Sachs’ compliance department in London, alleges that he was terminated shortly after returning from paternity leave in 2022. Reeves argues that his dismissal was a result of the bank’s disapproval of male employees taking extended parental leave, rather than the performance issues cited by Goldman Sachs.
Reeves contends that senior management at Goldman displayed negativity toward male employees who took lengthy paternity leave or faced childcare responsibilities. He claims that his role was at risk due to alleged underperformance, which was the first time in his 15-year career that he had received such feedback. His dismissal was confirmed within five weeks, and his legal team claims that it would not have happened if he had been a female employee in a similar role.
Goldman Sachs disputes the allegations, asserting that Reeves’ dismissal was based on longstanding performance issues and that his work had been evaluated against both male and female colleagues. Additionally, the bank revealed that Reeves had covertly recorded several meetings during his time as a compliance officer, which the firm described as a serious breach of conduct.
Goldman Sachs introduced a 26-week paid parental leave policy for all new parents in 2019, benefiting both fathers and mothers. In the UK, parental leave provisions are generally more generous than in the US, and the current government has proposed further extending paternity and unpaid parental leave from the first day of employment.
