June 24 (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Monday

tossed out a proposed class action claiming Uber Technologies' ( UBER )

policy of terminating drivers with low passenger

ratings is racially discriminatory.

The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

said Thomas Liu, a driver who filed the 2020 lawsuit, had not

provided any evidence showing that Uber ( UBER ) kicked non-white drivers

off its app at a higher rate than white drivers with low

ratings.

Liu's lawyers had argued that statistical evidence backing

up their claims would only be available if the case were allowed

to proceed to discovery, when plaintiffs can seek documents and

testimony from defendants. But a three-judge 9th Circuit panel

said Liu had failed to provide anything beyond speculation to

buttress his claim that Uber's ( UBER ) system is discriminatory.

Uber ( UBER ) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer for Liu, said she was "deeply

disappointed and concerned" about the ruling and would likely

ask the court to reconsider it.

Uber ( UBER ) asks passengers to rate drivers on a scale of one to

five and deactivates drivers who fail to maintain high scores.

Liu, who is Asian-American, said in the lawsuit that he was

deactivated after his rating fell below 4.6.

Liu claims passengers are more likely to give poor ratings

to non-white drivers, and Uber's ( UBER ) use of the rating system

violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and

California anti-discrimination law.

U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco granted

Uber's ( UBER ) motion to dismiss the case in 2022, saying there was no

plausible allegation of a statistical disparity among drivers of

different races. He said a survey by Liu's lawyers of thousands

of Uber ( UBER ) drivers that showed a disparity was flawed.

The 9th Circuit on Monday agreed, saying the survey had

numerous flaws and said nothing about the racial composition of

the overall population of Uber ( UBER ) drivers.

Liu was backed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity

Commission, which enforces Title VII.

The agency said in a friend-of-the-court brief that Liu

cited research showing that customer ratings are likely to be

influenced by bias, including for Uber ( UBER ) drivers and other gig

workers. That coupled with the survey by Liu's lawyers was

enough to establish a plausible case, the commission said.