The mother of a teenage sex assault victim has won \u20ac2,500 in an employment rights case, after her boss revoked a part-time remote work deal set up to help her look after her daughter and ordered her back to work with one day\u2019s notice.<\/p>\n
The award was made to the administrative worker in a wholly-anonymised decision under the Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Act 2023 published on Monday by the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC). <\/p>\n
It is the first time a worker has won compensation for not getting four weeks\u2019 notice, in writing, for the termination of a remote work arrangement, and is the maximum award permitted by the Act.<\/p>\n
The worker told a hearing last year that her 13-year-old daughter was \u201cseriously sexually assaulted\u201d by another minor at her school , had suicidal ideation, and was self-harming.<\/p>\n
She asked for and received permission to cut her in-office working days from five to three, which was put in writing and signed by her company\u2019s human resources manager.<\/p>\n
The worker said the arrangement helped \u201cgreatly\u201d while her daughter attended a hospital sexual assault unit for tests and for the taking of forensic evidence.<\/p>\n
The worker says she was still able to do her work from home while supporting her daughter through the process of the Garda investigation. The tribunal noted the worker\u2019s evidence that a file was being sent forward to the Director of Public Prosecutions.<\/p>\n
However, the managing director of the firm later returned from abroad, claimed the work-from-home arrangement was \u201cnot working out\u201d, and revoked it with immediate effect, the worker said. <\/p>\n
The complainant was told to be back in the office the following day, she said.<\/p>\n
The managing director\u2019s position on the remote work agreement signed with HR was: \u201cThat document does not exist,\u201d the worker said.<\/p>\n
The complainant quit after a period of sick leave, she said.<\/p>\n
The managing director\u2019s evidence at the WRC was: \u201cWe don\u2019t do that type of arrangement in this company.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hugh Hegarty of Peninsula Business Services, for the employer, argued that the claim was \u201centirely without merit\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe respondent felt the arrangement was not working and requested the complainant to return to the office and work as per her terms and conditions of employment,\u201d Mr Hegarty submitted.<\/p>\n
Upholding the complaint, adjudication officer Valerie Murtagh found the employer breached Section 22 of the Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Act 2023, as it had \u201cnot complied with the specified notice provisions and requirements\u201d for the revocation of the remote working arrangement.<\/p>\n
She noted that the worker was \u201ccompletely ignored\u201d when she asked her employer to set out \u201cclear, objective reasons\u201d for revoking the arrangement, and that \u201conly one day\u2019s notice\u201d was given.<\/p>\n
Murtagh concluded that \u20ac2,540, a sum of four weeks\u2019 pay \u2013 the maximum award under the Act \u2013 was \u201cjust and equitable\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis award reflects the egregious nature of the treatment of the complainant by the respondent and the detrimental adverse impact on the complainant,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n
The complainant said it fell to her to process work permits, when her ex-line manager fell ill, a \u201cquite onerous\u201d job for which she had no training, she added.<\/p>\n
The worker said the atmosphere at work was \u201chostile\u201d, and that when she complained about the new tasks at a meeting, the businessman told her: \u201cI made your duties and I will tell you what they are,\u201d the worker said, describing his tone as \u201cintimidatory\u201d.<\/p>\n
The adjudicator wrote that she was satisfied the complainant was subjected to a \u201chostile work environment\u201d after the remote work arrangement was revoked, where she was subject to \u201cmicromanagement and pressure\u201d.<\/p>\n
Despite that, the complainant went back to try to work out her notice after resigning, Ms Murtagh added.<\/p>\n
\u201cI found her to be an honourable, hard working and diligent employee and it is a testament to her character that despite the difficulties she experienced with the company, she persevered and worked hard and processed the work permits as best she could,\u201d Murtagh wrote.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy contrast, I found the testimony of the MD to be dismissive and lacking in candour,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The mother of a teenage sex assault victim has won \u20ac2,500 in an employment rights case, after her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466743,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,20774,43,40,38,41,39,6465],"class_list":["post-524704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-hybrid-working","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\/524704","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=524704"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524704\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=524704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=524704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=524704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}