PDD2513

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No's: ADJ-00033539 (CA-00044397-003)

BACKGROUND:

The Employee appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on 13 September 2023. A Labour Court hearing took place on 3 June 2025.

The following is the Decision of the Court.

DECISION:

This is an appeal by Daniel Hughes (“the Complainant”) against a Decision of an Adjudication Officer given under the under the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 (“the Act”) against his former employer Action Alarm Control 24 (“the Respondent”).

The Adjudication Officer found that the complaint was out of time.

The Complainant lodged an appeal of that decision and two other appeals UDD2535 and HSD2517 to the Labour Court. A hearing scheduled on 27 November 2024 was adjourned to allow the parties to lodge further submissions. All three appeals were heard on 3 June 2025. The Court heard evidence from the Complainant and three witness for the Respondent company – Aaron Mooney, Managing Director, Pat Moloney, Director and Sean Leavy, Technical Operations Manager.

1. Background The Respondent operates in the security industry providing intruder alarm and monitoring services to domestic and commercial premises. The Complainant worked as an Alarm Control Operator in the Respondent’s monitoring centre.

On 21 December 2020, the Complainant was reported as a Covid-19 close contact and left the workplace shortly thereafter. The Respondent contends that he did so without authority. The Complainant contends that he did not attend work on the advice of his GP. He submitted a medical certificate stating that he was unfit to attend work from 21 December 2020 to 4 January 2021.

On his return to work, the Complainant was issued with a Final Written Warning if 12 months duration. The Final Written Warning was reduced to six months duration on appeal, which was accepted by the Complainant on 4 February 2021.

On 10 February 2021, the Complainant instigated a grievance in relation to the disciplinary process and in relation to the denial of a trail promotional opportunity.  On 8 March 2021, the Respondent informed the Complainant that it considered the matter closed.

  The Complainant resigned his employment on 9 April 2021, citing constructive dismissal.

2. Summary of the Complainant’s position

  The Complainant made a protected disclosure within the meaning of Section 5 of the Act.  The employer failed to acknowledge or assess the disclosure.

  On 21 December 2020, the Complainant made an oral disclosure to his manager, Sean Leavy upon learning he had been identified as a close contact of a confirmed COVID-19 case. He informed Mr. Leavy that his General Practitioner had directed him to self-isolate and that, as a result, he could not attend work. This oral statement, made contemporaneously and in response to a legally significant health risk, constitutes a disclosure within the meaning of Section 5 of the 2014 Act. The disclosures concerned two categories of relevant wrongdoing: (i) breaches of legal obligations by the employer, and (ii) endangerment to the health and safety of individuals. Both forms of wrongdoing are expressly recognised under Section 5(3)(b) and 5(3)(d) of the Act.

The Complainant suffered multiple forms of penalisation because of making a protected disclosure including a disciplinary warning, denial of promotional opportunity, a mishandled grievance, workplace intimidation and psychological harm and unfair dismissal by way of constructive dismissal.

The penalisation consisted of the initiation of disciplinary proceedings, the imposition of a final written warning, an undeclared and retrospective ban on promotion opportunities, and procedural irregularities that compounded and extended the harm. In addition, the Complainant was constructively dismissed because of the employer’s continued retaliatory conduct after he made a protected act. These actions constituted a continuing wrong until the date of resignation.

     3.   Summary of the Respondent’s position

  The Complainant left the employment on 9 April 2021. The complaint is out of time, as the Complainant has failed to identify any act of penalisation within the cognisable period for the complaint. The matters raised by the Complainant relate to matters prior to the disciplinary process. When the Complainant accepted the outcome of the Appeal hearing those matters were closed.

The long delay in submitting the claim suggests that the allegation of penalisation was not in the Complainant’s mind at the time of his resignation. The only allegation of penalisation that falls within the six-month timeframe is his allegation of constructive dismissal.  That allegation is refuted.

Without prejudice to the above, the company takes its health and safety responsibilities very seriously. The company was in total compliance with HSE guidelines. It followed close contact guidelines and was not in breach of health & safety legislation. 

The Respondent refutes all allegations made by the Complainant that he was subject to penalisation.

4. Relevant Law

The relevant statute in place at the time of the complaint to the WRC was the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 of which sections 5 in relevant part defines a protected disclosure as follows:

5. (1) For the purposes of this Act “protected disclosure” means, subject to subsection (6) and sections 17 and 1, a disclosure of relevant information (whether before or after the date of the passing of this Act) made by a worker in the manner specified in section 6, 7, 8, 9 or 10.

(2) For the purposes of this Act information is “relevant information” if—

• (a) in the reasonable belief of the worker, it tends to show one or more relevant wrongdoings, and
• (b) it came to the attention of the worker in connection with the worker’s employment.

(3) The following matters are relevant wrongdoings for the purposes of this   Act—

• (a) that an offence has been, is being or is likely to be committed,
• (b) that a person has failed, is failing or is likely to fail to comply with any legal obligation, other than one arising under the worker’s contract of employment or other contract whereby the worker undertakes to do or perform personally any work or services,
• (c) that a miscarriage of justice has occurred, is occurring or is likely to occur,
• (d) that the health or safety of any individual has been, is being or is likely to be endangered,
• (e) that the environment has been, is being or is likely to be damaged,
• (f) that an unlawful or otherwise improper use of funds or resources of a public body, or of other public money, has occurred, is occurring or is likely to occur,
• (g) that an act or omission by or on behalf of a public body is oppressive, discriminatory or grossly negligent or constitutes gross mismanagement, or
• (h) that information tending to show any matter falling within any of the preceding paragraphs has been, is being or is likely to be concealed or destroyed.
• (i) …

(5) A matter is not a relevant wrongdoing if it is a matter which it is the function of the worker or the worker’s employer to detect, investigate or prosecute and does not consist of or involve an act or omission on the part of the employer.

(7) The motivation for making a disclosure is irrelevant to whether or not it is a protected disclosure. (8) In proceedings involving an issue as to whether a disclosure is a protected disclosure it shall be presumed, until the contrary is proved, that it is.

Statutory Time Limits

Section 41(6) and 41 (8) of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015, provides as follows:

“(6) Subject to subsection (8), an adjudication officer shall not entertain a complaint referred to him or her under this section if it has been presented to the Director General after the expiration of the period of 6 months beginning on the date of the contravention to which the complaint relates.”

“(8) An adjudication officer may entertain a complaint or dispute to which this section applies presented or referred to the Director General after the expiration of the period referred to in subsection (6) or (7) (but not later than 6 months after such expiration), as the case may be, if he or she is satisfied that the failure to present the complaint or refer the dispute within that period was due to reasonable cause.”

5. Deliberations and Findings

The Court’s jurisdiction in this appeal is confined to assessing breaches of the Act that occurred within the cognisable period for the complaint. The Complainant lodged his complaint to the Workplace Relations Commission on 6 October 2021, therefore, the relevant period for consideration is the period from 7 April 2021 to 6 October 2021. As the Complainant resigned from his employment on 9 April 2022, the Court’s jurisdiction is confined to assessing any complaints of penalisation that occurred in the period from 7 to 9 April 2021.

The Complainant in this case relies on the same set of facts to ground his complaint of penalisation under the 2014 Act as in a separate complaint made by him under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005. Both complaints were lodged to the WRC on the same date. The same acts of penalisation are alleged in both cases.

In decision HSD2517 the Court found that the Complainant has failed to provide evidence that he was subject to penalisation under the 2005 Act during the cognisable period for that complaint.  As a result, the Court found that the complaint was not well founded.

6. Finding For the same reasons outlined in that HSD2517, the Court finds that the Complainant has failed to make out a case that he was subject to penalisation for the making of a protected disclosure act under the 2015 Act during the cognisable period in this complaint.

As a result, the Court finds that the complaint of penalisation under the Act is not well founded. The Adjudication Officer’s decision is upheld.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Katie Connolly
FC	______________________
6 October 2025	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Ms Fiona Corcoran, Court Secretary.