ADJUDICATION OFFICER DECISION
Adjudication Reference:
Parties:
| Complainant | Respondent |
Anonymised Parties | A National Account Manager | A Food Company |
Representatives | | |
Complaints:
Act | Complaint/Dispute Reference No. | Date of Receipt |
CA-00020152-001 | ||
CA-00020152-002 | ||
CA-00020407-001 |
Date of Adjudication Hearing:
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer:
Procedure:
In accordance with Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act, 2015 following the referral of the complaints to me by the Director General, I inquired into the complaints and gave the parties an opportunity to be heard by me and to present to me any evidence relevant to the complaints.
Complaint Application CA-00020407-001 was withdrawn by the complainant by email on 24th August 2018.
Background:
The complainant was employed by the respondent from 2008 until his redundancy in 2019. The complaints relate to issues that arose in 2014 when the complainant raised concerns to Senior Management that the respondent was involved in fraudulent activity by generating false invoices. The complainant contends that his concerns were ignored when raised in 2014 and between 2014 and 2017 he was subjected to bullying and harassment by senior management. The complainant lodged a formal complaint in September 2017 and for varying reasons the internal grievance process did not conclude until June 2018. The complainant also claims that he was transferred to another area of the business as a result of having raised his previous complaints in September 2017 which he contends amounts to penalisation within the meaning of the Act. The complainant is seeking compensation in relation to his complaints The complaints were lodged to the Workplace Relations Commission on 3rd July 2018. |
Preliminary Point
The respondent contends that the WRC does not have jurisdiction to hear the complaints as submitted on the basis that the issues highlighted by the complainant are not offences within the meaning of the Prevention of Corruption Acts, 1889-2010. The respondent stated that Section 8A(5A) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 2001, specifically excludes the communication or furnishing of information that is a protected disclosure within the meaning of the Protected Disclosures Act, 2014. The respondent contends that the issues raised by the complainant were in fact protected disclosures within the meaning of that Act which is acknowledged by the complainant himself and is also acknowledged in correspondence from the complainant’s solicitors who were involved at the material time. |
Preliminary Point Findings and Conclusions:
The Applicable Law Section 2 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 2001 provides as follows: The Act of 1906 is hereby amended by the substitution of the following section for section 1: “1(1) An agent or any other person who— (a) corruptly accepts or obtains, or (b) corruptly agrees to accept or attempts to obtain, for himself or herself, or for any other person, any gift, consideration or advantage as an inducement to, or reward for, or otherwise on account of, the agent doing any act or making any omission in relation to his or her office or position or his or her principal's affairs or business shall be guilty of an offence. (2) A person who— (a) corruptly gives or agrees to give, or (b) corruptly offers, any gift or consideration to an agent or any other person, whether for the benefit of that agent, person or another person, as an inducement to, or reward for, or otherwise on account of, the agent doing any act or making any omission in relation to his or her office or position or his or her principal's affairs or business shall be guilty of an offence. (3) A person who knowingly gives to any agent, or an agent who knowingly uses with intent to deceive his or her principal, any receipt, account or other document in respect of which the principal is interested, and which contains any statement which is false or erroneous or defective in any material particular, and which to his or her knowledge is intended to mislead the principal shall be guilty of an offence”. Sections 8 A (5) and 5(A) of the Act of 2001 provide as follows: 8 A (5) An employer shall not penalise or threaten penalisation against an employee, or cause or permit any other person to penalise or threaten penalisation against an employee, for — (a) having formed an opinion of the kind referred to in subsection (1)and communicated it, whether in writing or otherwise, to an appropriate person unless the employee — (i) in communicating his or her opinion to that appropriate person did so — (I) knowing it to be false, misleading, frivolous or vexatious, or (II) reckless as to whether it was false, misleading, frivolous or vexatious, or (ii) in connection with the communication of his or her opinion to that appropriate person, furnished information that he or she knew to be false or misleading, or (b) giving notice of his or her intention to do the thing referred to in paragraph (a) (5A) Subsection (5) does not apply to a communication, or furnishing of information, that is a protected disclosure within the meaning of the Protected Disclosures Act, 2014. Having considered the matter, I am satisfied that the issues raised by the complainant in 2014 and in his formal complaint of September 2017 were protected disclosures within the meaning of Section 5 of the Protected Disclosures Act, 2014 and accordingly are outside of the ambit of the Prevention of Corruption Acts, 1889-2010. Accordingly, the complaints cannot succeed. |
Decision:
Section 41 of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 requires that I make a decision in relation to the complaints in accordance with the relevant redress provisions under Schedule 6 of that Act.
Dated: 8th October 2019
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer:
Key Words:
Bully and Harassment, Corruption, Protected Disclosures. |