ADJUDICATION OFFICER DECISION/RECOMMENDATION

 Adjudication Reference: ADJ-00009942

 Anonymised PartiesA WorkerA Government Department   Representatives GRA HR

Complaint(s):

ActComplaint/Dispute Reference No. CA-00011203-001 Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 6 of the Payment of Wages Act, 1991

Date Of Receipt: 09/05/2017

Date of Adjudication Hearing: 25/10/2017  

Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: Michael Hayes

Procedure:

In accordance with Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015 and the abovementioned Act,following the referral of the complaint(s)/dispute(s) to me by the Director General, I

enquired into the complaint(s)/dispute(s) and gave the parties an opportunity to be heard by me and to present to me any evidence relevant to the complaint(s)/dispute(s).  

Background:

 The respondent has employed the complainant since the 3rd of October 1979. The complaint (received by the WRC on the 9th of May 2017) concerns the non-payment of wages in respect of an alleged entitlement to payment of a “Gaeltacht Allowance”. The parties made written and oral submission to the hearing.

Summary of Complainant’s Case:

  The complainant submits that he worked in a Gaeltacht area for six months in 1984 and that he should have received the “Gaeltacht Allowance” at that time. He was not made aware of his entitlement then and was thereafter moved to a non-Gaeltacht area until September 2013. He moved to a different Gaeltacht area at that time and endeavoured to claim the allowance without success. He works with colleagues who are in receipt of the allowance and who have enjoyed the same prior to the abolishment of the allowance for new beneficiaries by the Government in September 2012. He asserts that he should not be regarded as a new beneficiary as he had a pre-existing entitlement to payment.  

Summary of Respondent’s Case:

  The respondent submits that it does not have the authority to rescind/overrule the decision of Government to abolish the “Gaeltacht Allowance” for new recipients of the 18th of September 2012. The definition of new beneficiary adopted by Government is a person who “was not in receipt of the listed allowances prior to the 31st of January 2012”.  

Findings and Conclusions:

  It is common case that as a matter of fact the complainant was not a beneficiary of the “Gaeltacht Allowance” prior to 18th of September 2012. Whatever the moral implications, it is not for me to decided and retrospectively apply an entitlement to an allowance allegedly applicable in 1983 with all the implications arising in the context of an Act which was introduced some seven years later. Therefore, I must conclude that herein complaint is misconceived under this enactment.    

Decision:

Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 requires that I make a decision in relation to the complaint(s)/dispute(s) in accordance with the relevant redress provisions under Schedule 6 of that Act.   The complaint is not well founded.    

 Dated:   23.01.2018

Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: Michael Hayes