The High Court granted summary judgment to former Harbour Master Senan Histon for €376,458.57 in unpaid salary and interest, finding Shannon Foynes Port Company had not shown a real or bona fide defence to his claim.
The claim covered salary from 22 September 2001 to 16 December 2004. The court said the amount due for that period was not disputed if Histon was entitled to be paid. The judgment was delivered by Ms Justice Finlay Geoghegan on 3 October 2006.
Histon had been purportedly dismissed in September 2001 after a dispute with the port company’s chief executive. In December 2004, the Supreme Court set aside part of an earlier High Court decision and declared that Histon “has not been validly removed from office in the employment of the defendant”. The Supreme Court held that ministerial sanction required for his removal had not been obtained. The declaration confirmed his employment status; it did not itself resolve the present salary application.
The port company sought to have the claim sent to a full hearing. It argued that Histon had not worked during the salary period and that he had failed to find alternative employment, so had not mitigated his alleged loss. The court considered those proposed defences at the summary judgment stage, applying the test of whether there was a fair or reasonable probability of a real or bona fide defence.
On the argument that Histon had not worked, the judge held that the Payment of Wages Act 1991 applied. She concluded that withholding all of his salary because he allegedly failed to turn up for work amounted to a deduction of 100% of his wages, prohibited by section 5(2) in the circumstances argued. The company had not claimed that any statutory condition permitting a deduction was met.
The judge also rejected the mitigation argument. She accepted that mitigation principles apply to claims for loss caused by a wrong, rather than to a claim for a debt due under contract or statute. She concluded the company had not established a bona fide defence and granted summary judgment as claimed in the summary summons.
The source ends at the court’s conclusion and does not state the wording of any separate formal order or address costs.