Workplace Relations Commission (WRC)<\/a> has directed Rose Finlay Pharmacy (Tullamore) Ltd to pay the sum to Dikeledi Nkele Mushapho, who lost her \u20ac100,000-a-year job there as supervising pharmacist last year. <\/p>\nConor McCrave of Setanta Solicitors, for Mushapho, told a hearing earlier this month that his client experienced \u201ca sharp decline\u201d in how she was being treated at work after disclosing her pregnancy on Tuesday, February 18th, 2025. <\/p>\n
The complainant gave evidence that she thought she was \u201cworking in a supportive environment\u201d when she made the disclosure. <\/p>\n
Since her appointment in November 2024, she said, \u201cthe numbers for the business were good and were rising\u201d and there was positive feedback on her performance, she said. <\/p>\n
However, on Friday, February 21st, 2025, a \u201cproductivity consultant\u201d appeared at her workplace for the first time, she said. <\/p>\n
McCrave submitted that his client was initially told the consultant was there to \u201csupport the team\u201d. <\/p>\n
On February 28th, 2025, Mushapho said her employer was unhappy that she was delayed getting back to work from a prenatal appointment. <\/p>\n
She stayed late to try to \u201cmitigate\u201d the delay, but had missed a deadline for ordering in medication \u2013 a matter which was \u201cused against her as a point of incompetence\u201d, it was submitted. <\/p>\n
The following month, Mushapho said her employer told her she was \u201cdisappointed in her performance\u201d in what she described as a \u201cquite belittling and intimidating\u201d conversation. <\/p>\n
A few days later, the consultant was given the job of assessing Mushapho\u2019s personal performance, the tribunal was told. <\/p>\n
Mushapho said she told the consultant that she had been doing the duties of \u201cmultiple staff\u201d as a floor manager was absent on maternity leave, a support pharmacist had quit, and the locum pharmacist brought in to cover the vacancy was only doing two days a week. <\/p>\n
The consultant disagreed with Mushapho\u2019s view and told her: \u201cI am disappointed in you,\u201d the complainant said. She considered this \u201cunusual\u201d, she told the tribunal. <\/p>\n
Mushapho told the tribunal that during the course of the consultant\u2019s involvement, she felt she was \u201cbeing micromanaged in order to get [me] to leave\u201d. <\/p>\n
Her employer called her in on March 21st that year and said she was \u201cstill not happy\u201d with her progress and told her she should move to a support pharmacist role, said Mushapho.<\/p>\n
When she questioned this in writing, she received an email in reply saying she would be dismissed if she didn\u2019t accept the demotion. She was dismissed on March 28th, 2025, the WRC heard. <\/p>\n
Adjudication officer Conor Stokes upheld the complaint in a decision published on Monday and awarded the worker \u20ac50,000 in compensation for the breach of the Employment Equality Act 1998. <\/p>\n
Mushapho was a \u201ccredible witness\u201d whose evidence had placed a burden of proof on her former employer to demonstrate \u201cexceptional circumstances\u201d justifying her dismissal while pregnant. <\/p>\n
As the employer didn\u2019t attend the hearing, \u201cno exceptional circumstances were provided\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cHaving considered all the written and oral evidence presented in relation to this matter, my decision is that the complainant was discriminatorily dismissed on the grounds of her pregnancy,\u201d he wrote. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A pharmacist who said she was told to take a demotion or face dismissal within five weeks of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":559511,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,61,60,1962,6465],"class_list":["post-559510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-work","tag-workplace-relations-commission"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559510","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=559510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559510\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/559511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}