Labour Court remits equal pay appeals for investigation of substantive issues

The Labour Court remitted Mary Kealy and Marian Keigher’s equal pay cases to the Equality Tribunal to investigate the substantive issues. The determination was dated 17 September 2010. The employers, Brothers of Charity Services (Clare) Ltd and Brothers of Charity Services (Roscommon) Ltd, had appealed a preliminary ruling against their defence that the pay differences were due to reasons other than sex. The Court said the questions about whether the women and their comparators performed like work could not be separated from the employers’ defence or investigated for the first time on appeal. With both parties’ agreement, it sent the cases back to the Equality Tribunal for examination of the substantive issues.