WRC awards Shane Finnegan €5,360 in statutory notice case

The Workplace Relations Commission awarded Shane Finnegan €5,360 after finding his statutory notice complaint well founded. In a decision dated 27 February 2023, it also found his health and safety penalisation complaint was not well founded. Finnegan, a welder employed by Darland Enterprises Limited for more than 15 years, said he was entitled to eight weeks’ notice after his dismissal. The company argued that it dismissed him for gross misconduct after he entered a tank to make a repair without using a gas meter to check whether the air was safe. The WRC found he was entitled to eight weeks’ notice because an associated decision had found his dismissal unfair. It rejected the penalisation complaint, finding no evidence that Finnegan had made a health and safety complaint to his employer. It also noted he had received redress for his unfair dismissal under the Unfair Dismissals Act. The €5,360 compensation equals eight weeks’ pay and is not subject to tax, PRSI or USC deductions.