Builder who called his boss a ‘sneaky rat' wins €9k for unfair dismissal
A builder fired after calling his employer a 'sneaky rat' in a row on-site has won €9,000 for unfair dismissal.
David Donohoe secured the award under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 on foot of a complaint against SJK Civils Ltd, where he had worked for 13 years until he was sacked in April 2024.
Mr Donohoe told the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) at a hearing in January that he was sacked on the spot from the €50,000-a-year job when he got into a dispute with his employer about working hours on Friday, April 5, 2024.
The complainant said he had been told to start work at 5.30am that day, an hour and a half earlier than his usual 7am, and to go to Dublin, collect building materials and bring them to a site.
He said that when he arrived with the material, he was told that despite the early start, he was expected to work until his usual finishing time of 3pm rather than 1.30pm.
Stock image
News in 90 Seconds - May 29th
He declined to do so, upon which his employer 'started giving out', he said.
'I called him a sneaky rat, that he had it all planned,' Mr Donohoe said in his evidence.
'He lost it again and said: 'Go home and don't come back in Monday,' so I tipped up the material and went home,' Mr Donohoe said.
The company's director, who was not identified in the decision, maintained that Mr Donohoe had only been sent away from the site on April 5, 2024, but was not dismissed from his employment until April 19.
He said that after Mr Donohoe wrote to him looking for a letter for the social welfare office to say he 'was sacked or whatever', he tried to arrange a meeting and called him to a 'capability hearing'.
When Mr Donohoe failed to attend, the director wrote to him again and told him his failure to attend the meeting was 'failure to follow a reasonable management instruction' and that his job was being terminated for 'gross misconduct' during the April 5 incident.
Mr Donohoe's solicitor, Frank Taaffe, argued the letters sent by the firm to his client were only 'seeking to mend the respondent's hand' by 'retrospectively applying a dismissal process after the fact of dismissal'.
Adjudication officer Anne McElduff wrote that both parties 'contributed to the escalation of matters to the point of dismissal' and that it was 'regrettable' there was no attempt to enter into dialogue after that.
Ms McElduff's view was that Mr Donohoe should have engaged when there were attempts to launch a formal process.
However, she said the company failed to refer him to the correct company policy and set an 'unreasonably short and unfair' deadline to either attend a hearing or have non-attendance be added to the charges against him.
The only option for appeal was to the company director, who had been directly involved with the incident of 5 April, she added.
'I consider the respondent has not discharged the burden of demonstrating the Complainant's dismissal was fair, reasonable or proportionate or that the process was conducted in accordance with fair procedures,' she wrote.
Mr Donohoe had claimed losses of €15,977 between April and August 2024, at which point he went into business for himself, the adjudicator noted.
Ms McElduff decided €9,000 was 'just and equitable in all the circumstances' and directed SJK Civils to pay Mr Donohoe that sum.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Daily Mirror
15 hours ago
- Irish Daily Mirror
Customer loses discrimination claim over Aldi checkout belt allegation
A woman who claimed a supermarket checkout operator spoke rudely to her after she could not lift a tray of water bottles on to a checkout belt has lost a claim that she was discriminated against because of her disability. The Workplace Relations Commission ruled that Aldi Stores (Ireland) Limited has not breached the Equal Status Act 2000 over its dealings with Christine Reilly when she visited one of its branches on September 6, 2024. The customer had claimed the German supermarket group had discriminated against her on grounds of her disability as she had been unable to lift the water bottles out of her trolley at the checkout as she had recently undergone spinal surgery. Ms Reilly claimed the checkout assistant stated that it was company policy for shoppers to place their items on to the checkout belt. The complaint said the assistant had begrudgingly helped her unload her trolley after a long exchange. Lansdowne House, the offices of the Workplace Relations Commission in Ballsbridge, Dublin. (Image: Colin Keegan, Collins Agency, Dublin) Ms Reilly also maintained that the store manager told her during a subsequent conversation that she did not have to shop at the store. Aldi denied the allegations and claimed the opposite had occurred with reasonable accommodation being provided to the complainant by the store assistant lifting the tray of water bottles onto the belt. The WRC heard that Ms Reilly's solicitor had written to Aldi six days after the incident in the store seeking compensation and an apology for the alleged discrimination. In his ruling, WRC adjudication officer, Brian Dalton, said the evidence of the cashier and CCTV footage of the incident wholly corroborated Aldi's account of events that Ms Reilly was reasonably accommodated and that her tray was lifted on to the checkout belt by the till operator. "There is no merit in the claim," said Mr Dalton. He also claimed there was no evidence to support the allegation that the complainant was spoken rudely to by the checkout assistant and the store manager. "What is clear is that within seconds her tray was placed on the belt by the cashier/shop assistant and she was reasonably accommodated," said Mr Dalton. Sign up to the Irish Mirror's Courts and Crime newsletter here and get breaking crime updates and news from the courts direct to your inbox.
Irish Times
6 days ago
- Irish Times
AIB first-half net profit falls 16% amid lower interest rates
AIB's net profit fell 16 per cent to €927 million for the first half of the year, as net interest income declined amid falling interest rates. Net interest income decreased by 10 per cent year-on-year to €1.87 million, AIB said in its latest interim report. Still, the effect of falling rates was marginally offset by a €400 million increase in loans over the course of the six months, to €71.6 billion. Other income fell by 9 per cent to €358 million, as higher fee and commission income was mainly offset by lower equity investment gains, it said. The bank reiterated its full-year forecast that net interest income will amount to €3.6 billion. Last year's result was €4.12 billion. The European Central Bank (ECB) has cut its main rate from 4 per cent to 2 per cent since June last year. Other income is expected to come in at about €750 million. READ MORE AIB announced its first interim dividend since the financial crisis, saying it will pay 12.328 cents per share, or a total of €263 million. [ 'A solution to a problem that didn't exist': AIB staff angered by cut to hybrid working Opens in new window ] 'The group continues to perform well in a resilient Irish economy against a backdrop of macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty,' said chief executive Colin Hunt. The bank booked a net loan loss charge of €85 million for the first half, up from €61 million for the year-earlier period. Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe recently sold the State's remaining 2 per cent stake in AIB for €305.3 million, bringing the total recovered to date from the bank to €19.8 billion. It means that AIB is set to fall about €700 million short of repaying its €20.8 billion taxpayer rescue bill, including the expected €300 million the Government is on track to receive from selling back stock warrants it continues to hold in the bank. The bank said earlier this month that it will require staff eligible for hybrid working to return to its branches and offices three days a week on a phased basis, introducing the tightest rules among Irish retail banks. The new regime will take full effect from the start of 2026. AIB had more than 10,400 employees at the end of last year. The group commenced a hybrid working model in early 2022, where the number of office days depend on the role. Hybrid-eligible employees were expected to be in the office for at least two days a week.
Irish Examiner
28-07-2025
- Irish Examiner
Labour Court to hear X appeal of payout for unfair dismissal to former Irish executive
The main Irish unit of Elon Musk's X will commence its appeal at the Labour Court on Tuesday against a ruling that it must pay out an Irish record unfair dismissal award of €550,131 to a former executive. In the ruling last August, Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) adjudicator, Michael MacNamee found that Twitter International UC - since renamed X Internet Unlimited Company - unfairly dismissed the company's former Director Source to Pay, Gary Rooney in December 2022 after he failed to respond to Elon Musk's 'Fork in the Road' email. Mr Rooney has yet to receive any of the monies as the case is before the Labour Court on appeal from Twitter International UC. The published Labour Court diary confirms that the Labour Court has set aside hearing days for Tuesday and Wednesday of this week at the Labour Court's Dublin HQ for the appeal. Solicitor for Mr Rooney, Barry Kenny of Kenny Sullivan Solicitors in Bray declined to comment on Monday ahead of the appeal. However, commenting last month on the impending Labour Court hearing, Mr Kenny said: 'My client is anxious to put all this all behind him.' He said last month: 'The WRC determined that X's treatment of him as a long standing and loyal employee amounted to an unfair dismissal. Mr Rooney is anxious that the Labour Court will affirm this decision.' Mr Kenny said: 'It is open to the Labour Court to increase or reduce sums awarded in the WRC as it will be a De Novo hearing.' He said last month that X had advised that they intend to call at least three witnesses while Mr Rooney is the only witness in his own case. At the WRC, Twitter International UC fully contested Mr Rooney's claim, over five days of hearing, contending that he had resigned voluntarily. In his findings, Mr MacNamee found that Mr Rooney was dismissed because he did not click 'yes' to Elon Musk's 'Fork in the Road' email on November 16, 2022 and for that reason alone. On November 16, 2022, Mr Rooney and the Twitter workforce received an email from the world's richest man, Mr Musk who said: 'To build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing a grade." Mr Musk said: 'If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below.' After Mr Rooney opted not to click 'yes' on the link, three days later on November 19, 2022, Mr Rooney received a further company email which stated that it is 'to acknowledge your decision to resign and accept the voluntary separation offer'. On receiving Mr Musk's 'Fork in the Road' email, Mr Rooney said his first reaction was disbelief and he was initially afraid even to open it for fear that it was spam or malware. The record €550,131 award was made up of Mr Rooney's remuneration losses of €350,131 from January 2023 to May 2024 and estimated future remuneration losses of €200,000. The remuneration losses were based on Mr Rooney's Twitter remuneration of €323,560 made up of €151,225 in pay and €172,335 in deferred cash consideration. Mr Rooney secured a new role with an employer in the banking sector in September 2023 on total remuneration of €129,897.
