UDD263

PARTIES:

DIVISION:

SUBJECT:

Appeal of Adjudication Officer Decision No's: ADJ-00050997 (CA-00062652-001)

BACKGROUND:

The Worker appealed the Decision of the Adjudication Officer to the Labour Court on 25 November 2024 in accordance with Section 8A of the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 to 2015. A Labour Court hearing took place on 17 February 2026.

The following is the Decision of the Court:-

DECISION:

1. Background to the Appeal

This is an appeal by Mr Victor Ogiem Udia (‘the Complainant’) from a decision of an Adjudication Officer (ADJ-00050997/CA-00062652-001, dated 25 November 2024) under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 (‘the Act’). The Adjudication Officer decided that the complaint under the Act was statute-barred. Notice of Appeal was received in the Court on 6 January 2025.

The Court heard the appeal in Limerick on 17 February 2026.

2. Factual Background

The Complainant commenced employment with One Complete Solution (OCS) Ireland Limited (‘the Respondent’) on 14 August 2020 as a Security Officer on the Respondent’s client sites. On 24 February 2023, the Respondent received a request to remove the Complainant from the client site he was assigned to at the time. The Respondent wrote to the Complainant placing him on temporary lay-off with effect from 27 February 2023, pending identification of a suitable alternative site to which he could be transferred. The temporary lay-off period was extended in writing by the Respondent every four weeks until a suitable opening on a client site became available on 24 December 2023. The Complainant thereafter commenced work on this alternative site.

3. Preliminary Issue

The Complainant referred his originating complaint under the Act to the Workplace Relations Commission on 26 February 2024. The cognisable period for the complaint is therefore 27 August 2023 to 26 February 2024. The Complainant initially submitted that he had been dismissed by the Respondent on 24 February 2023. He subsequently sought to amend that to the date on which the period of lay-off commenced, 27 February 2023.

The Respondent denies that the Complainant was dismissed on 24 February 2023, 27 February 2023 or at all. Without prejudice to their position in this regard, the Respondent submits that the complaint is out of time.

In response, the Complainant submits that he should be entitled to an extension of time as he only became aware as time passed that the lay-off on which he had been placed was, in reality, a cover for his dismissal.

4. The Law

Section 8(2) of the Act provides:

“A claim for redress under this Act shall be initiated by giving a notice in writing (containing such particulars (if any) as may be specified in regulations under subsection (17) of section 41 of the Act of 2015) to the Director General—

(a) within the period of 6 months beginning on the date of the relevant dismissal, or

(b) within such period not exceeding 12 months from the date of the relevant dismissal as the adjudication officer considers appropriate, in circumstances where the adjudication officer is satisfied that the giving of the notice within the period referred to in paragraph (a) was prevented due to reasonable cause,

and a copy of the notice shall be given by the Director General to the employer concerned as soon as may be after the receipt of the notice by the Director General.”

The established test for deciding if an extension should be granted for reasonable cause shown is that formulated by this Court in Labour Court Determination DWT0338 Cementation Skanska (Formerly Kvaerner Cementation) v Carroll.

Here the test was set out in the following terms: -

“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.”

In that case, and in subsequent cases in which this question arose, the Court adopted an approach analogous to that taken by the Superior Courts in considering whether time should enlarged for ‘good reason’ in judicial review proceedings pursuant to Order 84, Rule 21 of the Rules of the Superior Courts 1986. That approach was held to be correct by the High Court in Minister for Finance v CPSU & Ors [2007] 18 ELR 36.

The test formulated in Cementation Skanska (Formerly Kvaerner Cementation) v Carroll draws heavily on the decision of the High Court in Donal O’Donnell and Catherine O’Donnell v Dun Laoghaire Corporation [1991] ILRM 30. Here Costello Costello J. (as he then was) stated as follows:

“The phrase ‘good reasons’ is one of wide import which it would be futile to attempt to define precisely. However, in considering whether or not there are good reasons for extending the time I think it is clear that the test must be an objective one and the court should not extend the time merely because an aggrieved plaintiff believed that he or she was justified in delaying the institution of proceedings. What the plaintiff has to show (and I think the onus under O. 84 r. 21 is on the plaintiff) is that there are reasons which both explain the delay and afford a justifiable excuse for the delay.”

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 by the Complainant 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 the passage quoted above, 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.

5. Discussion

The thrust of the Complainant’s submission in support of his application to extend time is that his failure to comprehend the fact of his alleged dismissal in February 2023 “prevented” him from initiating his claim within the statutory timeframe for so doing and caused him to delay making his complaint under the Act until 26 February 2024.

The Complainant offered no explanation as to why his belief that he had been dismissed by the Respondent on 27 February 2023 only crystallised some two months after his period of lay-off had ceased on 24 December 2023 and almost twelve months after the date of the alleged dismissal.

Having regard to the foregoing, the Court finds that the Complainant has not established reasonable cause that both explains and justifies his delay in initiating his complaint under the Act.

The decision of the Adjudication Officer is upheld.

The Court so decides.

	Signed on behalf of the Labour Court
	Alan Haugh
AL	______________________
23 February 2026	Deputy Chairman

NOTE

Enquiries concerning this Decision should be addressed to Ms Amy Leonard, Court Secretary.