The Supreme Court allowed the State’s appeal in a case about whether a woman who worked in Ireland without a work permit could count the PRSI contributions from that work towards maternity benefit.
Ms Sharda Sobhy, a Mauritian national, arrived in Ireland in 2008 to study and worked lawfully until 2012. After two unsuccessful applications to remain, she continued living and working as a chef without permission to remain or a work permit. The relevant period ran from 26 June 2012 to 3 March 2019. She and her employer paid PRSI during that time, and PAYE was deducted from her earnings.
Ms Sobhy took maternity leave in December 2018 and applied for maternity benefit in April 2019, after she had been granted permission to remain and work. A Department deciding officer refused the claim, finding that contributions from employment undertaken without a valid work permit could not establish entitlement. The Chief Appeals Officer upheld that decision.
The High Court quashed the appeals officer’s decision and sent the matter back for reconsideration. It found that the legal effect of the unlawful employment contract on the contributions was not self-evident.
In a judgment delivered on 16 December 2021, the Supreme Court held that the contract could not count as a qualifying “contract of service” for the social welfare legislation. Justice Baker said the work permits legislation prohibited the employment and the immigration legislation treated a person without permission as unlawfully present. The court concluded that the Oireachtas had not provided a statutory exception allowing contributions from such employment to qualify for maternity benefit.
The court also rejected the argument that a more nuanced approach to illegal contracts in Quinn v. IBRC changed the result. It said that case concerned enforcement of a contract between its parties, while Ms Sobhy’s claim concerned a statutory benefit. Applying the policy of the work permit and immigration laws, the court concluded that paying maternity benefit on the basis of those contributions would frustrate that policy.
The Supreme Court therefore allowed the State’s appeal and did not remit the matter to the Chief Appeals Officer. It held that Ms Sobhy’s contributions could not be treated as reckonable for the claim and that she was not entitled to maternity benefit under the relevant code. The judgment records the State parties’ position that the PRSI contributions made by Ms Sobhy and her employer were to be refunded; the operative outcome described in the judgment was the rejection of the benefit claim.