Council loses appeal against Patrick O’Connor’s €10,000 workplace award

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Wexford County Council has lost its appeal against a €10,000 award to Patrick O’Connor for workplace penalisation. The Labour Court upheld the award in a decision dated 6 August 2026, following a hearing on 28 May.

O’Connor made a protected disclosure to the council on 1 November 2022 arising from an alleged assault by his line manager. He lodged a complaint with the Workplace Relations Commission on 13 June 2023, alleging that he was penalised after making the disclosure.

The council accepted that the disclosure was protected and that it had not completed an investigation, but denied that O’Connor had been penalised. It said a change of personnel had affected the investigation and accepted that its complaint-handling procedures had not been followed.

The Labour Court found that the failure to investigate was penalisation and had left O’Connor working in the same environment without a resolution. It also found that assigning him alone to an outer road closure at a dance festival in June 2023 was penalisation. The court rejected his claim concerning the loss of weekend lifts from his manager, noting that he had access to a council vehicle.

The complaint was separate from an earlier case in which O’Connor alleged that a colleague, identified as Mr F, had strangled him with a seatbelt in November 2019 and threatened him in July 2021. An adjudication officer initially awarded him €20,000 for penalisation after he complained.

The council appealed that earlier decision. On 8 July 2024, the Labour Court upheld its appeal and set aside the €20,000 award, finding that O’Connor had not established that he suffered penalisation or detriment for making his complaint.