Labour Court rules it lacked jurisdiction over Sean Reilly’s holiday pay complaint

The Labour Court varied an Adjudication Officer’s decision after finding it had no jurisdiction to consider Sean Reilly’s complaint about annual leave and public holiday payments. The Court’s decision was dated 25 May 2024. Reilly appealed after the Adjudication Officer did not uphold his complaint. He said he had received no paid holidays or public holiday payments during his work for the Minister For Enterprise Trade and Employment. The Minister argued that Reilly’s work had ended before the relevant period and that he was not entitled to the payments. The Court found that Reilly’s contractual relationship ended no later than 3 July 2018, before the statutory period covered by his complaint, which ran from 27 August 2018 to 26 February 2019. It therefore found there could be no breach during that period. The merits were not decided: the Court did not rule on whether Reilly was an employee or entitled to the payments.