Worker

Employer

Anonymised Parties

A Local Authority Worker

A Local Authority

Representatives

SIPTU

LGMA

Act

Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 13 of the Industrial Relations Act, 1969

IR - SC - 00004554

23/06/2025

This case concerns a disciplinary sanction which the complainant views as poorly conceived, unnecessary, excessive, and unfair in the circumstances. It has resulted in a drop in income and been detrimental to his health and wellbeing. He is seeking to return to his previous position and compensation for losses suffered.

The complainant commenced employment in January 1987 and had accumulated 39 years' service and  was promoted in 2011, and again in January 2016, with responsibility for administration and operational matters.  He has a good work record, free of any disciplinary sanctions, prior to the issues which led to his demotion.

 In December 2021 he was notified of bullying allegations made against him, the facts of which were to be determined under the Employers Dignity at Work policy in order to establish if a full formal investigation would take place. This involved the gathering by management and HR] of emailed allegations and the result of this was a decision, on 12 January 2022, to appoint an external investigator to carry out an investigation under the Dignity at Work Policy.

Documentation issued on January 26th, 2022, from the investigator, which included the Terms of Reference and documentation gathered in the fact-finding operation. The allegations were quite vague six were  identified.

The investigation was to be conducted in accordance with the applicable codes of practice.  It commenced in January 2022 and concluded at the end of June 2022, with twelve individuals having been interviewed and the issuing of, an almost, 400-page report. The investigation, having started out with six allegations, concluded with a Report listing forty findings.   Six allegations were upheld, two were not.

The  investigation was not confined to the six initial allegations outlined in the Terms of Reference, and as a consequence breached the terms. Additional allegations were included as they were being raised, despite there being no provision under the TOR to address additional issues, if they were to arise,

The Investigation also reached certain conclusions in relation to the person who made the complaints but upheld most of the complaints against the complainant.

There was no appeal by the complainant against the investigation findings, and this was followed by a Disciplinary hearing, which concluded with the demotion of the complainant  shortly thereafter.

He suffered ill health for a lengthy period between December 2022 and December 2024. In January/February 2025, he returned to work in the demoted position, under protest and on the lower pay rate.

This was appealed, but due to the complainant’s being on sick leave  the appeal hearing was put on hold and was eventually heard in February 2025. (The complainant was not represented by SIPTU and the outcome, which upheld the original decision to demote issued on 19 February 2025.

The demotion took effect from the 19 February 2025, from which time the complainant  was placed on reduced income. A complaint was submitted to the Workplace Relations Commission under the Industrial Relations Act on 23 June 2025. The grounds for this referral are as follows:

The failure to give sufficient weight to his long service and good record.

The further failure to prevent a known contentious situation at the complainant’s workplace  deteriorating.

The absence of focused Training/Mentoring for the complainant and his co workers

The failure by the Employer, to take into account the obvious difficulties associated with the demotion of a person at the complainant’s level, back to work alongside people who he had previously managed.

The excessive level of the sanction.

(Further written argument was submitted on each of these). 

When faced with the dilemma of deciding on an appropriate sanction, employers should give serious consideration to the potential impact of this on the recipient.

The demotion naturally results in a substantial pay reduction for the complainant , creating major financial difficulties, especially given his 12 years' service at the higher paid ranks. Demotion is damaging to morale, it can be destructive, more often impairing relationships between people as opposed to enriching them.

The respondent took none of this into consideration when deciding on the sanction in this case. Perhaps the hope was that the complainant  would leave the job, but although he has not come out of this unscathed, he has sufficient resilience to carry on.

Specifically, regarding the alleged excessive level of the sanction we see no evidence in the documentation in this case, of consideration of a lesser sanction as contained in the respondent  Disciplinary Procedure, which include, Written Warnings, Suspension without Pay, transfer to another task, Demotion.

It is a requirement in a fair process to consider all options and to show why the sanction chosen was decided upon and why a lesser one was not deemed appropriate. There was no such reasoning provided; therefore, we can only suppose that nothing less than demotion was given any consideration.

This is a failure in the process and an injustice to the complainant, who up to this point in his career had no issues raised around his ability or competency in carrying out his role.

The complainant’s case is simple, and it is this- while taking on board the findings of the Halloran Investigation Report, his Employer should have looked at the bigger picture and not simply take these findings and use them to penalise the complainant.

 It appears that management took the easier option of removing him in an attempt to placate the crew rather than taking a proactive approach to addressing the whole situation. This is in effect enabling bullying in the workplace.

The complainant has been punished for identifying and attempting to improve bad practices at his workplace. The investigation Report also assigned blame to the person who complained in a number of areas and also found him to be in breach of procedures.

It can be difficult to quantify loss of earnings in a situation like this, given the payment system in place for the complainant, and also because stress and humiliation is difficult to quantify.

In summary, the respondent has a stringent warning system available to them under their Disciplinary procedure.

Demotion can be workable option in some circumstances, e.g. as part of a move to a different department, or shift pattern in a large organisation, where the background of the move may not be known to other colleagues, or if the demoted person worked remotely etc.

However, in a small workplace of approximately twelve staff, the demotion of a senior person back to  the lower ranks, where the rumour mill will know or have invented the background to the demotion, and a portion of those he must now place his trust in, on the frontline had brought about this demotion, is unimaginable from the perspective of the demoted Officer.

The complainant  could still undergo training specifically tailored to the local circumstances. He has already been punished by the effects of this process on his health- which necessitated a lengthy absence on sick leave.

This sanction is unfair and undeserved and should now be lifted, and the worker compensated appropriately.

The complainant addressed the hearing and said that he accepted that the disciplinary hearing had been procedurally fair. However he believed that the outcome was engineered to force him to resign from his employment which he was not prepared to do

The respondent submitted that it had complied with best practice at all points of the process.

The complainant was fully advised of all his rights, and the investigation was carried out by an independent investigator with a good deal of experience in the sector in which the respondent operates.

Specifically on the issues raised by the complainant regarding the disciplinary sanction, the possibility of alternatives to the demotion were fully considered, as were the mitigating factors referred to above. Ultimately the sanction applied was well within the range of reasonable sanctions.

Indeed a more serious sanction might have been considered were it not for the mitigating factors.

The Decision Maker (DM) in the disciplinary hearing gave evidence.

She stated that she had fully complied with all of the respondent’s policies and noted also that at all stages these had been communicated to the complainant. She stated that all options in relation to a possible sanction were considered.

A particular consideration in her evaluation of the appropriate sanction was the obligations arising under anti-bullying and health and safety policies. Under the latter, the respondent is obliged to eliminate any risk of a recurrence of the conduct which had occurred in this case.

She took into account that nine incidents of bullying had been upheld by the investigator and a lesser sanction than demotion would have had the complainant returning to the position of responsibility in which he had misconducted himself.

A key consideration was the complainant’s adversarial style of management, and this had been found to have contributed to the problem; he used bullying as a management tactic.

Other options were also considered but were ruled out on practical grounds.

She said that having regard to the gravity of the misconduct and the finding of gross misconduct which followed, termination of the complainant’s employment was within the options considered, and the submission on mitigation played a part in her deciding not to apply it.

In conducting my investigation, I have taken into account all relevant oral and written submissions presented to me by the parties.

The complainant submitted five grounds of appeal, and these were well ventilated at the hearing. A number of these were similar and they can be grouped into two categories.

In the first category, three related to the severity of the sanction one way or another.

The other two grounds related to the failure of the respondent to intervene earlier in the matter, one in respect of the situation of conflict which gave rise to the allegations against the complainant and one that the respondent failed to provide proper training and monitoring.

So, they can be considered under two headings to which I return below.

Some words on the role (I hesitate to say jurisdiction) of an Adjudication Officer in a matter such as this may provide some context for what follows.

It is not dissimilar to complaints under the Unfair Dismissals Act  in that it is based on the notion of oversight of the processes carried out by the employer (although also the conduct of the employee).

There is a critical difference in that an Adjudicator makes a legally binding Decision under that legislation rather than a Recommendation, but nonetheless it is helpful to approach it with that idea of oversight in mind.

The Labour Court and many decisions of this tribunal make it clear that neither forum will intervene in referrals under the Industrial Relations Act unless workplace level processes are fully complied with and this illustrates the measure of deference that is shown to the workplace procedures, subject of course to there having been conducted fairly.

And while the Act speaks of a ‘trade dispute,’ one of the predecessors of the WRC which had jurisdiction for this Act was the Rights Commissioner service and its name captures part of the essence of the jurisdiction; the role is to ensure that a complainant’s rights, specifically to a fair procedure have been fully vindicated.

Returning to the matter in hand, as noted above the complainant raised two sets of issues.

The first related to the severity of the sanction, that it was excessive in general terms, that insufficient account had been taken of his service (mitigation) and there had been a failure to take account of the impact of the demotion on the complainant.

We can look at the first two of these together. The oral evidence above of the disciplinary decision maker was persuasive and emphatic that she had considered all the options in relation to sanction, and she effectively provided a strong and reasoned rebuttal of this assertion by the complainant’s representative. She explained in detail why, having considered them, other sanctions were not suitable.

Without her saying as much there was an inference that the complainant should consider himself fortunate that he still had a job on the conclusion of the process.

In respect of the third limb of this I  think that only a very limited obligation falls on a decision maker to consider the effects of a sanction which is otherwise considered merited by reference to the normal criteria. It is hard to conceive of any sanction that would not have an adverse impact on the affected party. Again, the Decision Maker explained clearly why she thought it was merited and therefore its impact is a secondary matter.

The other category of appeal related to the alleged failure of the respondent to intervene more effectively to avoid the developing conflict. Some submissions were made by both sides as to why this was not more effective.

While conflict avoidance and amicable resolution should always be the preferred approach, where these are either not availed of, or have not  been successful, to then raise them in the course of a later formal process can only have very limited relevance to the decision, except where they provide an actual defence of, or excuse a party’s actions.

On  these facts, I do not consider this to provide a valid basis for challenging the outcome, firstly because it is far too remote from this complaint at this stage and also because it does not provide a basis for excusing the complainant’s actions as determined at the level of the workplace.

There is a further reason which applies to all of the grounds of appeal before the WRC.

All of these grounds of appeal before the WRC had been before the Appeal Hearer at the level of the workplace and no case was advanced as to why an Adjudicator should look at them any differently than he did by reference to the oversight criteria I set out above.

Specifically no case was made out of a breach of fair procedure or other relevant flaw in the decision makers’ approach.

Indeed, on the contrary, while such grounds (procedural flaws) would be the most frequent grounds for a complainant mounting a challenge to the workplace level process, in this case the complainant rather honestly accepted that the disciplinary hearing had been conducted fairly and that he had no criticisms of it.

This is also the view I take and therefore can find no basis to disturb the outcome of the workplace level proceedings.

Of course, all of this must have been traumatic for the complainant, but the disciplinary Decision Maker very clearly set out the gravity of the issues before her and her reasons for acting as she did.

No grounds were advanced in the course of the hearings to intrude into either her conclusions or decision on sanction or the conclusions of the Appeal Hearer and I decline to do so.

Disciplinary processes, sanction