The House of Lords, in the recent case of London Borough of Lewisham v Malcolm [2008] UKHL 43, has clarified the meaning of "less favourable treatment" in relation to disability discrimination. For actionable "less favourable treatment", the alleged perpetrator must have known about the disability and used this as a factor in deciding on how to treat the person. For institutions, this means that they will not be liable for treating a person less favourably as a result of a disability if the institution did not know about the disability. It should be noted that the other duties under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (such as the requirement to make reasonable adjustments) are independent of this, and may still apply. The House of Lords also decided that when comparing the treatment given (in order to determine less favourable treatment), the comparator to be used is a non-disabled person in the same circumstances. For example, in the facts of the case, a council tenant lost his right of security to his leased property as he had sublet it, and left the property, and he claimed his actions were due to schizophrenia. The court held that to determine "less favourable treatment", his actions had to be compared with a non-disabled tenant who had sublet and left the property, rather than a non-disabled tenant who had not sublet and left. Institutions can therefore be more certain that by treating students, staff and other service users equally, they will not fall foul of "less favourable treatment" discrimination. Again, they must consider separately the duty to make reasonable adjustments. The full text of the decision by the House of Lords is available at:http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKHL/2008/43.html