Complainant

Respondent

Anonymised Parties

A healthcare assistant

A recruitment agency

Act

Complaint/Dispute Reference No.

Date of Receipt

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 77 of the Employment Equality Act, 1998

CA-00026667-001

18/02/2019

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under the Industrial Relations Acts

CA-00026667-002

18/02/2019

Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under section 13 of the Industrial Relations Act, 1969

CA-00026667-003

18/02/2019

The complainant is a healthcare assistant employed by a recruitment agency and would carry out her duties for a number of clients as and when required. The agency would inform the Complainant where and when her services would be required and would be responsible for paying her wages and managing her employment.

The Complainant commenced employment with the recruitment agency on 04/04/2018.

Whilst working on the agency’s client site (a hospital) the Complainant alleges that she was touched in an inappropriate manner in the region of her buttocks by another health care assistant, a male.

The Complainant informed her assailant that there was no need for him to touch her in this region of her body and informed him that touching was the main ingredient for assault.

Later, while the Complainant was in the kitchen area the same male employee entered the kitchen area and touched her on her shoulder and said hi. The Complainant informed the male member of staff that touching her without her consent was inappropriate.

The Complainant when speaking to the Director of Nursing at the end of her shift suggested that more training was possibly required.

The Director of Nursing during a conversation with the Complainant at the end of her shift made enquiries of the Complainant on how she would like to see the matter handled and further enquired if the Complainant had spoken to any other member of staff in relation to these incidents.

The Director of Nursing also asked the Complainant if she wanted to speak to anyone in the agency who had arranged for her to work there, the Complainant said no and felt that she had dealt with the matter, she was only letting the Director of Nursing know about the incident, she did not want anything done.

The Director of Nursing states that the Complainant was not making a formal complaint, she just wanted her to know about the incident.

The Director of Nursing did inform the Respondent and also informed that the Complainant wanted no further action taken, that she was just informing the Director of Nursing what had happened.

The incident in question happened on a night shift 27th/28th June 2018, the Complainant reported the matter to the Director of Nursing on 28th June at 8.10am.

Section 77 (5) of the Employment Equality Act 1998 clearly states the following:

“(5) Subject to subsection (6), a claim for redress in respect of discrimination or victimisation may not be referred under this section after the end of the period of 6 months from the date of the occurrence or, as the case may require, the most recent occurerrence of the act of discrimination or victimisation to which the case relates”.

The complaint has not been made to the Workplace Relations Commission within the cognizable period specified within the Act, I have no alternative but to deem the complaint as not being well founded.

CA-00026667-002 & CA-00026667-003 – complaints referred under the Industrial Relations Act of 1969.

The Complainant has included more than one incident in her complaint, the one discussed and explained at the hearing of the complaint took place in a hospital and was the subject of a complaint referred under the Employment Equality Act 1998, I have addressed this complaint and found it to be out of time.

Following the complaint mentioned above the Complainant lost her shifts at the hospital location. When questioned in relation to this the Respondent informed that the Complainant had worked a total of 22 shifts for the agency in a total of 6 different locations / clients. Three out of six clients that she had worked for informed the agency they did not want her to return to them in future, no exact reasons for this were provided.

The Complainant has alleged that she was dismissed from her employment, this is denied by the Respondent. The Complainant moved to Kerry early this year, the Respondent does not have clients in the Munster region at this point and have said that should this situation change at any time in future they would certainly consider the Complainant.

I am satisfied that no dismissal took place and it is impossible for the Respondent to offer the Complainant work while she is residing in Kerry.

There has been no dismissal or penalisation.

The complaints under the Industrial Relations Act are not well founded.

The complaints as presented are not well founded.