The High Court has dismissed an employee’s appeal on points of law against Labour Court determinations concerning working time and employment information, refusing the reliefs he sought.
Mr Justice White gave judgment on 6 December 2017 in Edgaras Petraitis’s appeal against Philmic Limited, trading as Premier Linen Services. The appeal challenged determinations issued on 8 June 2016. Petraitis had asked the High Court to set them aside and remit the appeals to a differently constituted Labour Court.
The Labour Court had found breaches of sections 12 and 17 of the Organisation of Working Time Act 1997 and ordered the employer to pay €1,000 compensation. It found no breach of sections 19 and 21 concerning annual leave and public holidays. In a separate determination under the Terms of Employment (Information) Acts, it found breaches of sections 3(g) and 3(ga), but set compensation at nil.
Petraitis argued, among other points, that the Labour Court mishandled the employee handbook submitted after the hearing and failed to address his requests for witness summonses and to make submissions concerning litigation advice privilege. He also challenged the compensation and the Labour Court’s conclusions on employment entitlements.
The High Court said its role was limited to reviewing points of law and that the Labour Court was entitled to substantial deference as an expert tribunal. It rejected several grounds as factual matters for the Labour Court and found no general legal requirement for the Labour Court to break down the €1,000 award between the two working-time breaches.
On the handbook, the High Court said it could not resolve whether the Labour Court had requested the 2010 document or whether it had been sent without the appellant solicitor’s consent. It found that the alleged procedural breach, if there was one, was particularly minor, and that the appeal had not established substantial differences from a handbook the employee acknowledged receiving and reading.
The High Court criticised the Labour Court for not giving reasons for its treatment of the summons request and privilege submission. But it described the request for broad categories of advice and correspondence, without identifying specific documents or explaining their relevance, as an unfair trawling exercise. It declined to remit that issue, concluding that the Labour Court’s failure to address it had no bearing on the fairness of its determinations on the employment claims.
The court refused the reliefs sought. The Labour Court determinations therefore remained in place.