Catering assistant Debbie McFarlane says she lost her job at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, for wearing 11 rings on her fingers.

Mrs McFarlane, 36, of Brome Place, Barton, Headington, had been working for Bateman's catering company for six months before her boss banned her from wearing jewellery.she could not wear her jewellery any more.

She said: "I went into work and my boss turned round and said to me that she was going to give me a week to take off all my rings and my bracelet.

"I said: 'You can't do that as they don't come off.' Why all of a sudden say it now? I said she shouldn't have given me a job in the first place.

"When I went for my interview I told the lady none of my rings would come off. She said: 'It's all right, you can wear gloves'." Mrs McFarlane, whose job involves carrying trays of food to the patients, said her boss, Helen Keys, told her it was in case she had an accident but that she was allowed to wear a wedding band.

Mrs McFarlane, who has walked out of her job, said: "Somebody can have an accident with that.

"I'm not going to go back as I would have to work a week then have to leave. I think it's disgusting - after all I have been there for six months. When I do serve food I have always got gloves on."

Despite repeated attempts by the Oxford Mail to speak to the company, it did not respond.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.