Legal News (Employment Law)

2015 was a very busy year for Irish Employment Law practice. With reform of the basic framework for dealing with employment disputes and a new Industrial Relations Act, the procedural landscape of employment law in Ireland has been significantly altered. Anne Lyne outlines the key developments.

The Labour Court has upheld a decision of the Equality Tribunal that a teacher was entitled to succeed in her claim that she was discriminated on the grounds of age and religious belief in the course of an interview for the position of principal of the school in which she worked. Anne Lyne outlines the case in which Hayes acted for the teacher.

Mediation is an efficient, practical and cost-effective method of dispute resolution. It can provide a quicker, cheaper and more effective way of arriving at a suitable outcome than litigation. Breda O’Malley explains.

Broad ranging and invasive employment vetting practices are often common in other jurisdictions and employers establishing in Ireland are often surprised to find such practices to be subject to legal constraints in this jurisdiction.

A recent decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union (“the CJEU”) has the potential to have significant ramifications for employers in that the Court decided that certain categories of workers who travel from their homes to customers’ premises are considered to be working, for the purposes of the EU Working Time Directive (Directive 2003/88/EC), while making those journeys.

A recent record award by the Employment Appeals Tribunal (EAT) has underlined the reality that due process and fair procedures in workplace issues play a key role in business risk management.