The Labour Court overturned a Rights Commissioner’s decision and found An Post breached part-time work law by paying Mary Thomas and Paula Riordan half the service leave given to comparable full-time employees. The determination was signed on 20 September 2011.
Thomas and Riordan were job-sharing Post Office Clerks who worked full days on a week-on, week-off roster. An Post gave them one service-leave day rather than the two available to full-time employees with similar service. The CWU argued that service leave depended on years of service, not hours worked. An Post said it applied the same pro-rating approach as for other leave and argued that granting the full entitlement would bring significant costs.
The Court found that service leave depended on years of reckonable service, so the Act’s rule for pro-rating benefits based on hours worked did not apply. It held that An Post’s policy contravened the Act and that both complaints were well founded. The Court rejected cost as a defence and overturned the Rights Commissioner’s decision.