{"id":398294,"date":"2026-04-14T17:34:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T17:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/398294\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T17:34:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T17:34:08","slug":"wrc-rejects-e360000-employment-rights-claim-by-go-to-rte-video-editor-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/398294\/","title":{"rendered":"WRC rejects \u20ac360,000 employment rights claim by \u2018go-to\u2019 RT\u00c9 video editor \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A video editor in the RT\u00c9<\/a> newsroom has lost a \u20ac360,000 employment rights claim in the Workplace Relations Commission<\/a> (WRC) after a ruling that she failed to establish in evidence that she was an employee during the relevant period.<\/p>\n

Maebh Keary di Lucia claimed she was denied pay-related statutory entitlements and her earnings were suppressed because she \u201cmisclassified\u201d as a contractor from 2004 to 2011, when she was working shifts in RT\u00c9. <\/p>\n

Keary di Lucia said when she subsequently received a contract of employment it \u201cincorrectly\u201d stated that she started work at the national broadcaster in 2011. <\/p>\n

That meant her service was not recognised, her advancement on the pay scale for her grade was delayed, and she has been denied a long-service allowance since summer 2024. <\/p>\n

All in, she said she had been left short in the region of \u20ac360,000. <\/p>\n

She pointed to determinations by the Department of Social Protection, the Social Welfare Appeals Office, and the Revenue Commissioners that despite being paid via invoice, Keary di Lucia had been an employee before receiving a contract of employment in 2011. <\/p>\n

Keary di Lucia said that in response to \u201cconsistent findings\u201d of \u201cmisclassification\u201d, RT\u00c9 had \u201csolely paid PRSI\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve paid the State, but they have not repaid me,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

RT\u00c9\u2019s lawyers said the WRC had no jurisdiction to rule on the case due to time limits in the Workplace Relations Act. <\/p>\n

Keary di Lucia said she was being denied her rights under European Union directives, requiring the WRC to set time limits aside. <\/p>\n

Keary di Lucia said she wrote to a manager arguing that she ought to be on staff starting in February 2007 and pursued a dispute to the Labour Relations Commission (LRC) in 2008. <\/p>\n

At the WRC case last year, broadcaster Colm \u00d3 Mong\u00e1in appeared as a witness and gave evidence on a conversation he overheard in May 2008 in the RT\u00c9 news department between a manager and a senior video editor responsible for rostering. <\/p>\n

\u201cI heard [the manager] tell [the senior editor] that he should only use Maebh as a last resort until this thing had blown over. I was surprised by that because Maebh was very much a go-to video editor,\u201d \u00d3 Mong\u00e1in said. <\/p>\n

The LRC decided it had no jurisdiction, Keary di Lucia said. \u201cThey took a sidestep,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Asked by adjudicator Christina Ryan whether she had made further requests about her working conditions, Keary di Lucia said: \u201cI didn\u2019t, because of the evidence Colm \u00d3 Mong\u00e1in gave. <\/p>\n

\u201cI became very stressed and my hair began to fall out. I felt I could not pursue the issue,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

In her decision, published on Tuesday , Ryan wrote that Keary di Lucia\u2019s complaints all relied on a finding that she was an employee at the relevant time. <\/p>\n

She found the evidence before her was \u201cnot sufficient\u201d to allow her make that finding. <\/p>\n

Though Keary di Lucia had presented some 4,400 pages of documents in support of her case, \u201cit was not opened, explained or verified in oral evidence by the complainant\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn those circumstances, I am unable to attach evidential weight to that material,\u201d Ryan found. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A video editor in the RT\u00c9 newsroom has lost a \u20ac360,000 employment rights claim in the Workplace Relations…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398295,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,14313,61,60,11522,6085,176018,1962,6465],"class_list":{"0":"post-398294","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-department-of-social-protection","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-revenue-commissioners","13":"tag-rte","14":"tag-social-welfare-appeals-office","15":"tag-work","16":"tag-workplace-relations-commission"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398294","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=398294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398294\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}