Labour Court recommends continuing Carlow County Council worker’s guaranteed overtime

In a recommendation signed on 28 September 2009, the Labour Court recommended that Carlow County Council continue a 2003 agreement guaranteeing four weekly overtime hours to a worker in its Housing Section, unless and until it is voluntarily renegotiated. The Council and the Services Industrial Professional Technical Union had disputed the removal of the overtime during local-authority payroll reductions. The Court said the agreement formed part of the worker’s relocation terms and remained binding until renegotiated. It accepted the Council’s need to make savings but found the agreement made this overtime exceptional and said it would not be reasonable to discontinue it in these circumstances.