Workplace Relations Commission<\/a> (WRC) boss Audrey Cahill was alleged to have said the comments when a senior civil servant went to her to say she was leaving the agency last year.<\/p>\nGiving evidence before a hearing of the employment tribunal on Friday, witness Andrew Heavey said it was his belief that the alleged remark explained why he and fellow adjudicator Seamus Clinton were not shortlisted for interview for management jobs at the WRC.<\/p>\n
He said he believed this was because he and Clinton had acted as shop stewards when a group of around a dozen WRC adjudicators employed as civil servants campaigned to have their jobs boosted in grade.<\/p>\n
The State has advanced the proposition that the departing official may have had \u201can axe to grind\u201d against Cahill. Heavey was giving evidence this evening on complaints brought by Clinton under the Employment Equality Act 1998, the Protection of Employees (Provision of Information and Consultation) Act 2006, and the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 against the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment.<\/p>\n
Clinton and Heavey were among 10 applicants \u2013 five men and five women \u2013 to apply for three senior posts as regional managers overseeing the WRC\u2019s conciliation and mediation services (CAMS) in October 2024, the tribunal has heard.<\/p>\n
Only one of the men was shortlisted, and three women were ultimately appointed, according to data obtained by Clinton when he initiated an equality case over the recruitment competition.<\/p>\n
Heavey said on Friday that on April 2nd, 2025, a colleague approached him in the workplace and asked for a word. He said she told him that Cahill \u201chad said some things to her that were very upsetting\u201d.<\/p>\n
The departing official went on to say that in the course of the conversation, the question of the internal adjudication officers\u2019 campaign for regrading came up, Heavey said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll I ever hear about is internal AOs [adjudicating officers], and I\u2019ll tell you something else: neither Andrew Heavey nor S\u00e9amus Clinton will ever get another interview or any jobs in the WRC while I\u2019m director general,\u201d were Cahill\u2019s alleged words, according to the departing official, Heavey said. <\/p>\n
Asked why he thought he didn\u2019t get an interview for the management position, Heavey said: \u201cIn my view, it was our role as representatives on the upgrade \u2013 that\u2019s what I believed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Heavey pointed to 33 years\u2019 experience in the Civil Service, nine as an adjudication officer at the WRC, and two prior interviews he had attended for vacancies at principal officer grade, a level above the job opening in dispute.<\/p>\n
He said he was \u201cgobsmacked\u201d not to make the cut.<\/p>\n
Counsel for the Department of Enterprise Stephen Hanaphy said: \u201cYou know, I wonder about that, because we\u2019re two days out from International Women\u2019s Day; you were saying you were gobsmacked \u2013 the reality is: you just didn\u2019t perform.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s your contention, Mr Hanaphy. I believe my application was thorough, well-prepared and submitted in good faith,\u201d Heavey said.<\/p>\n
Giving evidence on Friday, Paul Malone, the deputy general secretary of Clinton\u2019s trade union, the Association of Higher Civil and Public Servants (AHCPS), said it was \u201cvery unusual, in fact possibly unique\u201d that the employer had decided to draw up a shortlist for \u201ca relatively small number of internal candidates\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe found it extraordinary,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Clinton claims he was penalised for acting as a trade union branch rep for a group of adjudication officers seeking an upgrade of their roles, from principal officer grade in the Civil Service to higher principal officer. Malone\u2019s evidence was there was a \u201chostile\u201d attitude towards the regrading process from the Department of Enterprise.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat hostility has maintained through the last two to three years,\u201d he said, adding that the position of the adjudicators had been met by \u201cobfuscation, defensiveness, hostility and a lack of positive inclination to this claim\u201d on the part of administrators, he said.<\/p>\n
While the Civil Service Arbitration Board had granted the regrading \u2013 and backdated it to July 2023 \u2013 the response of the Department of Enterprise was that it had not been sanctioned by the Department of Public Expenditure.<\/p>\n
The State\u2019s position is that Clinton does not meet the definition of a staff representative for the purposes of the Protection of Employees Act.<\/p>\n
Malone said he was satisfied Clinton had a \u201cmandate to speak for the collective group\u201d of adjudicators. Clinton gave his evidence-in-chief last week, and was cross-examined on Friday by counsel for the State, Stephen Hanaphy.<\/p>\n
Clinton had referred to what he said was a contemporaneous diary note of a phone call with his colleague, Heavey, recounting what the other official had told Heavey.<\/p>\n
\u201cPart of it was written in blue ink, part in black,\u201d counsel said. He put it to the complainant it was \u201cnot a contemporaneous note\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI clarified that the difference in ink colour was, in preparing submissions and getting my case to my legal team that I would have checked with Andrew Heavey to say: \u2018Andrew I recorded this, what did you say.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201c[Heavey] made an addition: \u2018As long as she was director general of the WRC, I wouldn\u2019t be selected for interview or I wouldn\u2019t get a competition,\u2019\u201d the complainant added. <\/p>\n
\u201cSo, the diary entry in blue is purported to be a contemporaneous note; the black amendment to that is the result of your having had a subsequent conversation with Mr Heavey,\u201d Hanaphy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cLess an amendment, more an addition,\u201d Clinton said.<\/p>\n
Hanaphy put it to Clinton: \u201cYou assumed you\u2019d coast in and get the interview \u2013 otherwise you wouldn\u2019t have been knocked over by a feather.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI expected to get an interview,\u201d Clinton said.<\/p>\n
Hanaphy said it seemed to him Clinton thought he would \u201cimpress the interview panel orally had had underestimated the written application. \u201cYou put all your eggs in one basket: the interview process,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d Clinton said. \u201cThere was only 10 applications. It would never have dawned on me there would have been a shortlist and that I would not get on the shortlist,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou filled in those boxes and failed to give as much specific information as other candidates. Can you accept that\u2019s what\u2019s happened?\u201d Hanaphy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d Clinton replied. Hanaphy put it to him that his claim for discrimination \u201cdoesn\u2019t stack up\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not just an impression. It\u2019s backed up by documentary evidence,\u201d Clinton replied. Adjudicator Brian Dalton has adjourned the case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A witness has said he was told that the director general of the State\u2019s employment rights watchdog declared…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24067,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39,6465],"class_list":["post-332795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-workplace-relations-commission"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}