{"id":634197,"date":"2026-09-24T05:34:25","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T05:34:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/634197\/"},"modified":"2026-09-24T05:34:25","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T05:34:25","slug":"supervalu-worker-claims-sexual-harassment-claim-was-retaliation-for-homophobia-complaint-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/634197\/","title":{"rendered":"SuperValu worker claims sexual harassment claim was retaliation for homophobia complaint \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A supermarket worker who said he was accused of getting drunk and touching a colleague at a work Christmas party as retaliation against his complaint about another employee subjecting him to homophobic abuse has lost his employment rights case.<\/p>\n

Richardson Reboucas claimed he was discriminated against and penalised on the grounds of his sexual orientation by his former employer, Boyne Valley Supermarkets Ltd, trading as Smith\u2019s SuperValu<\/a>, in Navan, Co Meath, as well as being penalised for whistleblowing. <\/p>\n

At the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) <\/a>on Tuesday, Reboucas said he complained to his employer verbally when a male colleague, X, was \u201cthreatening\u201d to him and used \u201chomophobic words\u201d towards him. <\/p>\n

X called him a \u201cf*ggot\u201d, Reboucas told adjudication officer Niamh O\u2019Carroll when she asked him for specifics of the March 30th, 2025, incident at a hearing in July. <\/p>\n

He said the company investigated a complaint he made and decided that \u201cthe homophobic behaviour was proven\u201d, but \u201cdid not punish\u201d X. <\/p>\n

Reboucas said his ex-employer had earlier refused to give him a copy of an external investigation report and did not do so until he made a Garda complaint. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe following week, after I got the report, there was a new investigation opened, this time against me,\u201d he said, in response to an allegation \u201cregarding sexual abuse that had taken place supposedly four months before, at Christmas\u201d. <\/p>\n

He maintained this allegation was \u201cretaliatory\u201d, and that the supermarket\u2019s handling of the matter was \u201cdiscriminatory and designed to obstruct\u201d. <\/p>\n

\"\"Soaring energy costs and why \u2018we can\u2019t protect everyone from the impact of war\u2019<\/p>\n

A human resources consultant engaged by the employer, Ray Hoare, gave evidence that on April 6th, 2025, another worker, Y, emailed the company\u2019s accounts department alleging that Reboucas had sexually harassed him at the staff Christmas party on December 14th, 2024. <\/p>\n

The allegation was that Reboucas \u201cwas extremely drunk, making sexual and lewd remarks such that it made him [Y] uncomfortable, inviting him to nightclubs and bars, such that [Y\u2019s] friends had to intervene\u201d, Hoare said. <\/p>\n

Hoare said the complaint by Y, by email, preceded Reboucas\u2019s complaint about X by four days. <\/p>\n

However, Reboucas said he complained verbally about X first, when he went to company director Fiona McQuillan on March 30th, 2025, the day of the alleged homophobic abuse. <\/p>\n

\u201c[Y\u2019s] parents actually came into the premises to explain to Fiona that this young lad wasn\u2019t able to cope with what happened with Richardson [Reboucas] in that Christmas party, rubbing his chest, making lewd comments, inviting him to nightclubs afterwards,\u201d Hoare said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey accused me of somehow touching sexually someone on the torso during the Christmas party,\u201d Reboucas said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI had done nothing, and this was only a way of putting obstacles on my claim against [X],\u201d Reboucas said. <\/p>\n

Hoare\u2019s evidence was that he upheld allegations of harassment and verbal abuse committed against Reboucas by X. <\/p>\n

X quit before he could proceed with disciplinary action, and apologised to Reboucas, Hoare added.<\/p>\n

Reboucas said he was asked directly at the party: \u201cAre you gay?\u201d and said he answered: \u201cYes, I am gay,\u201d because it was a \u201crelaxed\u201d party setting.<\/p>\n

\u201cI openly showed my sexuality, that I had not a problem with it, and they started asking me questions in a way intended to shame me, make me feel ashamed of my sexual orientation,\u201d Reboucas said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI presented the facts. [Hoare] showed the comments of the witnesses, and again it was stated that nothing had happened, nothing serious or no abuse had taken place,\u201d Reboucas said.<\/p>\n

He said his bosses told him at the meeting that other witnesses \u201chad seen nothing suspicious or nothing sexual abuse-related during the Christmas party\u201d. <\/p>\n

He remained in the job for four more months and quit in November that year, the tribunal heard. <\/p>\n

In her decision, O\u2019Carroll wrote that there was no evidence that the amount of time taken to release the report on the Christmas party allegation was linked to Reboucas\u2019s sexual orientation or to his whistleblowing. <\/p>\n

Nor was there evidence to support his claims of further adverse treatment in the months before he quit, the adjudicator wrote. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Carroll dismissed all Reboucas\u2019s complaints under the Employment Equality Act 1998 and the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 as \u201cnot well-founded\u201d. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A supermarket worker who said he was accused of getting drunk and touching a colleague at a work…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":634198,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,61,60,28993,6465],"class_list":["post-634197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-supervalu","tag-workplace-relations-commission"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634197","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=634197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/634198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=634197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=634197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=634197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}