ADJUDICATION OFFICER DECISION
Adjudication Reference: ADJ-00057612
Parties:
| Complainant | Respondent |
Parties | Martin Hamill | Kildare And Wicklow Education And Training Board |
Representatives |
| Lian Rooney IBEC |
Complaint(s):
Act | Complaint/Dispute Reference No. | Date of Receipt |
Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 6 of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991 | CA-00070108-001 | 20/03/2025 |
Date of Adjudication Hearing: 15/09/2025
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: David James Murphy
Procedure:
In accordance with Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015 following the referral of the complaint to me by the Director General, I inquired into the complaint and gave the parties an opportunity to be heard by me and to present to me any evidence relevant to the complaint.
Background:
The Complainant is a qualified teacher working in adult education since 1995. He is paid at an hourly rate and carries out identical teaching work during both the daytime and evening. He is paid as a qualified teacher for the work carried out in the day and as a tutor for the work carried out in the evening. He alleges that he is entitled to the qualified rate of pay for all of his teaching work and has brought a complaint under the payment of wages acts. |
Summary of Complainant’s Case:
The Complainant made written submissions and gave evidence under affirmation. He is a qualified teacher and is paid hourly and as such he should be paid at the correct rate which is the qualified teacher hourly rate rather than as a tutor. He is a full time employee and the teaching council have recognised him as qualified. However, when he teaches in the evening he is paid at a tutor rate. This is for performing the same job. He was never engaged as a tutor and has only ever been engaged as a teacher. In 2016 qualified rates were brought in. He has since been recognised as qualified by the Teaching Council, effective from 2010. He submits that he is entitled, by law, to be treated in a non-discriminatory and equitable manner. |
Summary of Respondent’s Case:
The Respondent made oral and written submission through their IBEC rep Ms Rooney. From the outset of their case they emphasised that they really value Mr Hamill as a long term member of staff and as an educator. The Complainant works under three separate contracts with arose from three separate offers related to three separate sets of hours. He is employed under a resource worker contract. He is also employed under a qualified teachers contract. Finally he is employed under an adult education tutor contract. It is the pay related to this third contract that is in dispute. Ms Aine O’Sullivan gave evidence under affirmation for the Respondent. She is an Assistant Principal Officer with responsibility for HR and IR matters. Evening hours are always paid at tutor rates and qualified teacher rates stop at 6pm. This has always been understood as a term of the collective agreement that established consistent qualified teacher rates and criteria for the ETBs nationally in 2016. The Complainant originally worked for the Respondent entirely on the basis of tutor pay rates. He then got recognised as qualified by the Teaching Council. The moved the applicable hours up to the qualified rate and backdated these hours to 2016. Teaching work after 6pm has never attracted qualified rates and they pay everyone working these hours at a tutor rate. |
Findings and Conclusions:
This act regulates unlawful deductions from wages. For the Complainant to succeed in his claim he must first establish that a deduction has taken place. Section 5(6) sates that Where—(a) the total amount of any wages that are paid on any occasion by an employer to an employee is less than the total amount of wages that is properly payable by him to the employee on that occasion (after making any deductions therefrom that fall to be made and are in accordance with this Act), or (b) none of the wages that are properly payable to an employee by an employer on any occasion (after making any such deductions as aforesaid) are paid to the employee, then, except in so far as the deficiency or non-payment is attributable to an error of computation, the amount of the deficiency or non-payment shall be treated as a deduction made by the employer from the wages of the employee on the occasion. The Complainant argues that the Respondent are obliged to pay him the qualified teacher rate, rather than the tutor rate, for evening work. Following the terminology used in the above clause, the qualified rate is properly payable and the difference in pay is the deduction. The Respondent submits that they do not offer the qualified teacher rate of pay for evening work. It is not sufficient for the Complainant to argue that he should be paid at a different rate of pay or even to establish that a different rate of pay would be more equitable or reasonable. For his claim to succeed he would need to prove an entitlement to that rate of pay by way of contact or SEO/ERO or other law. He has not done so. As such there is no deduction and there can be no breach of the act. |
Decision:
Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 requires that I make a decision in relation to the complaint(s)/dispute(s) in accordance with the relevant redress provisions under Schedule 6 of that Act.
I find that the complaint is not well founded. |
Dated: 16th of September 2025
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: David James Murphy
Key Words:
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