Courts / Dublin / Report
Groundskeeper nearing retirement who had to push manual cart 15km per day wins €15k for ageist discrimination
Summary
Gary Prendergast, a groundskeeper at Park West Utilities Management Ltd, was awarded €15,000 by the Workplace Relations Commission for ageist discrimination after his employer replaced his electric litter cart with a manual cart that he had to push 15km daily. Prendergast, who had worked at the site for over 15 years and was nearing retirement, claimed that the replacement of the cart and the monitoring of his work by the operations manager, who allegedly remarked that he was "slowing down," were intended to encourage him to quit. He had taken medical leave for stress in October 2022, citing the manager's surveillance as a contributing factor. The adjudicator accepted that the company's failure to provide a motorised cart was not economically justified but concluded that the lack of a suitable replacement discriminated against Prendergast on the basis of his age, and ordered the company to pay the compensation.
Who, what, where, when and why
What: Report matter: Groundskeeper nearing retirement who had to push manual cart 15km per day wins €15k for ageist discrimination. Procedural stage: trial
When:
- October 2022 Other
- June 2022 Other
- 2024-04-18 Publication
Why: The failure to provide a motorised cart to replace the old one caused Mr Prendergast a "significant disadvantage… specifically because of his age", Ms Byrne wrote. CNI source report
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