Complainant

Respondent

Parties

Harold  Wynne

Amgen Technology ( Ireland) Amgen Technology

Representatives

Michael Doyle A&L Goodbody LLP

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 21 Equal Status Act, 2000

CA-00074038-001

04/08/2025

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 77 of the Employment Equality Act, 1998

CA-00074038-002

07/11/2025

There is a preliminary issue in this case.

The complainant referred a workplace related complaint to the WRC on August 4th, 2025, under the Equal Status Act; erroneously it appears. That Act applies to discrimination in respect of the provision of services etc. to the general public and not to employment issues.

Following correspondence with the WRC he then submitted a complaint under the Employment Equality Acts on November 7th, 2025, in which he described the most recent date of a breach of the Act as March 3rd, 2025, and the first breach on December 12th, 2024.

The  key incident referred to in his evidence took place on November 26th, 2024.

The complainant has been on sick leave since February 2nd, 2025.

The complainant gave evidence on oath.

He had an incident during a return to work interview with his manager on November 26th, 2024.

In the course of the meeting, he told her three times that he needed to leave the meeting to get medication, but she ignored his requests.

Eventually, he told her he had to leave in order to avoid an emergency incident, and he went and got his medication.  He attempted to go back to work and felt unwell, so sought First Aid, and they rang an ambulance and he was brought to hospital.

He submitted a grievance and received an email in response that did not reflect what he had said.

In relation to the delay in making his complaint he said in evidence that this was due to his having been on sick leave. He had been unwell before going on sick leave on February 6th, 2025, but none of this was medically certified absence.

However, he said that he did not feel well enough to put in a complaint in that period between the incident on November 26th and going on certified sick leave.

He also said that he was not aware of the role of the WRC and only became aware of it when told by a local Garda.

The Respondent’s has been prejudiced in the preparation of this submission and the hearing due to a lack of particulars or a detailed submission by the complainant. The respondent only received email correspondence sent by the Complainant to the WRC on 7 November 2025 on 26 June 2026.

The complainant also provided particulars in an email of June 16th,  2026 in response to an express request for further particulars of his claim, but this email did not provide the clarity sought.

The respondent only received a copy of the completed Employment Equality Act complaint form (CA-00074038-002) on July 10th,  2026.

The crux of the  complaint from the materials provided relates to the alleged behaviour of his line manager at a meeting on November 26th,  2024, which occurred more than six months prior to the submission of any claim to the WRC and is therefore statute barred.

There was no request for an extension of time, nor any reasonable cause to do so, particularly as he was in a position to instruct and attend with a solicitor in March 2025 within that six-month period. No claim was submitted until August 4th, 2025, more than eight months after the November 2024 meeting and this claim (CA-00074038-001) was (incorrectly) brought under the Equal Status Act.

This is a preliminary objection. As a fundamental issue of jurisdiction, and should be dealt with at the commencement of the hearing, as on the grounds of disability, or any ground, and the claim should alternatively be struck out on this ground having regard to the provisions of section 85A of the EEA.

The materials do not identify how the alleged treatment is said to be linked to the disability ground, nor do they identify any comparator or any specific workplace rule or treatment alleged to have a discriminatory effect.

The Complainant’s formal grievance in respect of the meeting of 26 November 2024 was fully investigated by the Respondent in accordance with its policies. No breach of health and safety as alleged was found, nor was there any finding of less favourable and/or discriminatory treatment found. There was no appeal submitted by the Complainant.

The Respondent has at all times treated the complainant fairly and the WRC does not enjoy jurisdiction to hear his claim. Furthermore, it is submitted it is necessarily dealt with as a preliminary issue as if successful, it will dispense with the need for a substantive hearing and relatedly the need for the Respondent to call any witness evidence in defence of the claim.

The complainant has not set out any facts of sufficient significance from which any acts of discriminatory or less favourable treatment on any discriminatory grounds could be inferred. The Complainant has set out no prima facie case of discrimination  or less favourable treatment on any discriminatory ground are denied.

Having regard to the particular facts of this case it is necessary to deal with the issue as to whether a complaint has properly been made within the time limits, or whether there is any reasonable cause to extend them.

The incident which gave rise to the complaint took place on November 24th 2024.

Only limited evidence was heard on oath, (and from the complainant only) as to what transpired on that day but, even as he described it, it did not seem to add up to very much; a delay of about thirty seconds in the complainant being permitted to go to get his medication. He was not, in fact, prevented from leaving the room or detained beyond the period of a half a minute.

However, to make a complaint to the WRC about this incident the complainant would have been required to do so by May 25th, 2025. He did so on August  4th and did so under the wrong legislation.

While he was on sick leave since February 2nd, 2025, but that still left a period of in excess of two months that he was still at work and when he could have made a complaint.

He submitted a workplace grievance about the issue on December 12th, 2024 (which was investigated but not upheld) and the respondent submitted that the complainant had interactions with a solicitor in March, still within the cognisable period.

Following correspondence with the WRC he then submitted a complaint under the Employment Equality Acts on November 7th, 2025, in which he described the most recent date of a breach of the Act as March 3rd, 2025, and the first breach on December 12th, 2024, neither of which is connected to the incident of November 24th, 2025.

No evidence was provided of a breach on either of these dates and so the incident in November 2024 remains the operative date of any alleged breach. The Employment Equality Act complaint was submitted just a couple of weeks shy of a year from the incident which was the subject of the complaint.

The complainant’s explanations for the delay were particularly unpersuasive.

He continued to be at work after the incident on November 26th until he went on sick leave on February 6th, 2025.

However, he said that he did not feel well enough to put in a complaint in that period between the incident and going on certified sick leave.

This was somewhat, to put it no more strongly, contradicted by subsequent evidence that he was not even aware of the role of the WRC until told by a local Garda, although he could not say when this was. Also he was well enough to instruct a solicitor in March who apparently did not mention the option of a referral to the WRC.

So the delay boils down to the fact that the complainant says he did not know that he could make a complaint. While this too, stretches credibility it contradicts the initial explanation that he was somehow not well enough  to make the complaint, which in turn was not very credible.

These explanations come nowhere near meeting the ‘explain and excuse’ test.

That test was formulated by the Labour Court in Cementation Skanska (Formerly Kvaerner Cementation) v Carrol Determination DWT 0338 and in other cases and may be summarised as the ‘explain and excuse’ test.

“It is the Court’s view that in considering if reasonable cause exists, it is for the claimant to show that there are reasons which both explain the delay and afford an excuse for the delay. The explanation must be reasonable, that is to say it must make sense, be agreeable to reason and not be irrational or absurd. In the context in which the expression reasonable cause appears in the statute it suggests an objective standard, but it must be applied to the facts and circumstances known to the claimant at the material time. The claimant’s failure to present the claim within the six-month time limit must have been due to the reasonable cause relied upon. Hence there must be a causal link between the     circumstances cited and the delay and the claimant should satisfy the Court, as a matter of probability, that had those circumstances not been present he would    have initiated the claim in time.

 The length of the delay should be taken into account. A short delay may require only a slight explanation whereas a long delay may require more cogent reasons. Where reasonable cause is shown the Court must still consider if it is appropriate in the circumstances to exercise its discretion in favour of granting an extension of time. Here the Court should consider if the respondent has suffered prejudice by the delay and should also consider if the claimant has a good arguable case.”

The Labour Court subsequently endorsed this in Salesforce.com v Leech EDA1615 held as follows:

 “It is clear from the authorities that the test places the onus on the applicant for an extension of time to identify the reason for the delay and to establish that the reason relied upon provides a justifiable excuse for the actual delay.

Secondly, the onus is on the applicant to establish a causal connection between the reason proffered for the delay and his or her failure to present the complaint in time.   Thirdly, the Court must be satisfied, as a matter of probability, that the complaint would have been presented the complaint in time were it not for the intervention of the factors relied upon as constituting reasonable cause. It is the actual delay that must be explained and justified. Hence, if the factors relied upon to explain the   delay ceased to operate before the complaint was presented, that may undermine a    claim that those factors were the actual cause of the delay.

Finally, while the established test imposes a relatively low threshold of reasonableness on an   applicant, there is some limitation on the range of issues which can be taken into account. In particular, as was pointed out by Costello J in O’Donnell v Dun Laoghaire Corporation [1991] ILRM 30, a Court should not extend a statutory time limit merely because the applicant subjectively believed that he or she was justified in delaying the institution of proceedings.”

In considering the criterion to be applied as to whether reasonable cause exists, the Labour Court said in Department of Finance v IMPACT. [2005] E.L.R. 6.  that it was for the applicant to show that there were reasons which both explain the delay and which afford an excuse for it. This imports a clear objective standard into the test. The Court continued:

“The Court must also be satisfied that the explanation offered is reasonable, that is to say, it must be agreeable to reason and not be irrational or absurd. This is essentially a question of fact and degree to be decided by applying common sense and normally accepted standards of reasonableness. The standard is an objective one but it must be applied to the facts known to the applicants at the material time.

The complainant has not come remotely close to explaining or excusing the delay and both cases fail as they have not been submitted within the statutory time limits, and no reasonable explanation has been offered for his failure to do so.

For the reasons set out above neither complaint CA-00074038-001 nor CA-00074038-002 is upheld .

Time Limits