Labour Court says it lacks jurisdiction over Enercon technicians’ pay dispute

The Labour Court said it lacked jurisdiction to make a recommendation on a pay and conditions dispute involving Enercon Windfarm Services Ireland Limited and a Group of Technicians represented by Connect Trade Union. The recommendation was signed on 18 June 2018. The dispute covered pay, overtime, public holiday and bank holiday pay, on-call and call-out payments, and health and safety. The union said the technicians were comparable to workers at Vestas, Siemens and GE Energy. Enercon argued the workers had different duties, skills and qualifications. The Court said it lacked enough information about job structures, duties, qualifications and responsibilities to find the workers comparable. Because it could not make that finding, it lacked jurisdiction to consider the remaining tests or make a recommendation; the merits were not decided.