The High Court has rejected an appeal by civil servants who argued that a Labour Court determination wrongly dismissed their claim of discrimination over a pay settlement. Mr Justice O’Keeffe concluded that no error of law had been shown.
The appeal concerned a settlement agreed in 2003 between the Department of Finance and the Civil and Public Services Union (CPSU). The Department agreed to pay €34 million, with the settlement covering claims arising from a longstanding equal-pay dispute involving clerical assistants and a predominantly male grade known as Paperkeeper. The CPSU had not invited men in the clerical assistant grade to make claims on the basis that the original equal-pay claim was for women.
The appellants were among clerical officers who said they were excluded from the settlement. They complained that the exclusion discriminated on grounds including gender. An equality officer rejected their application in March 2006. The Labour Court dismissed their appeal in February 2007, finding that they had not established a prima facie case of discrimination. The appellants then appealed to the High Court under section 90 of the Employment Equality Act 1998.
The appeal focused on a ratio in the Labour Court’s statistical table. The appellants said the table understated the ratio of women to men in the advantaged group: the percentages elsewhere in the table, 77% for women and 52% for men, produce a ratio of 1.48 to 1, rather than the printed 0.67 to 1. They argued the error affected the Labour Court’s assessment of whether the settlement had a disproportionate impact and relied on a statistical test submitted by affidavit.
The respondents objected that the appeal was confined to a point of law and could not be used to add evidence. The High Court excluded the additional affidavit material, including the conclusions attributed to the statistician, and considered the Labour Court determination and the claimed error in the table.
Justice O’Keeffe held that the incorrect ratio was a presentation error based on percentages in the table that were not challenged. He said the correct ratio could be derived from those figures and that the mistake did not amount to an error of law. He also held that it was open to the specialist Labour Court to assess the statistics, their limitations and the other circumstances it had identified.
The High Court therefore concluded that the appellants had not demonstrated an error of law and rejected the appeal. The judgment does not set aside the Labour Court determination or grant the requested declaration.