ADJUDICATION OFFICER DECISION
Adjudication Reference: ADJ-00009099
Parties:
| Complainant | Respondent |
Parties | Olumide Smith | Workplace Relations Commission |
Complaint:
Act | Complaint Reference No. | Date of Receipt |
Complaint seeking adjudication by the Workplace Relations Commission under Section 21 Equal Status Act, 2000 | CA-00011679-001 | 24/05/2017 |
Date of Adjudication Hearing:
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: Pat Brady
Procedure:
In accordance with Section 25 of the Equal Status Act, 2000 following the referral of the complaints to me by the Director General, I inquired into the complaints and firstly considered as a preliminary matter if I have jurisdiction to hear the complaints and if the claims are properly before me for investigation.
Background:
This is one of a large number of complaints made by the complainant arising from interactions in the courts and in various employment tribunals. The respondent named in this case is the Workplace Relations Commission. Other respondents named in the same complaint are the Courts Service of Ireland and the Department of Jobs Enterprise and Employment. |
Summary of Complainant’s Case:
The complainant has identified his complaint on the ES1 Form as follows. Based on my email correspondences to the Respondents postmarked “9 March 2017 at 09:18” and “9 March 2017 at 09:40”, it would appear that your acts and/or omissions as a secure Data Controller caused me to be harassed, victimised, and treated disrespectfully, dismissively, disdainfully, abusively and unfavourably during the High Court Hearings and Judgements (reference numbers supplied), where other third Parties to the Equal Status Complaints filed against The Courts Service concerning the racist harassments which I suffered from a Circuit Family Court Judge, having gained access to the said Equal Status Complaints consequently abused my privacy and confidentiality Rights when these Complaints were disclosed in the High Court as a smearing campaign which consequently provoked against me adverse treatment or adverse consequence as a reaction to a complaint or to proceedings aimed at enforcing compliance with the principle of equal treatment. He identifies the respondent’s possible liability with the following question. On what basis or justification did the Respondents as above released or caused to be released to the said third Parties the details of the Equal Status Complaints which I filed concerning racist harassments which I suffered in two consecutive in-camera Circuit Family Court Hearings? On what basis or justification did the Respondents as above reneged on their obligations as a Data Controller at my detriment concerning the said Equal Status Complaints which third Parties gained access to and disclosed inappropriately in the said High Court? |
Summary of Respondent’s Case:
The respondent did not reply to the complaint. |
Findings and Conclusions:
The complainant faces a number of obstacles here. While it is not easy to discern the essence of the complaint it seems clear enough that, at its source, it derives from proceedings in the courts. (The dates referred to as being the incidents of the complaints are specified in other complaints as being the dates of court proceedings; viz February 24th, 2017 and March 3rd, 2017). While noting that the complaint form is used to name three respondents and no effort has been made to associate a particular respondent with any specific alleged breach the following must be taken to refer to each of the respondents, including this one. The complainant says, ‘it would appear that your acts and/or omissions as a secure Data Controller caused me to be harassed, victimised, and treated disrespectfully, dismissively, disdainfully, abusively and unfavourably during the High Court Hearings and Judgements.’ It is very clear from this that the alleged acts of harassment etc being were those of a Court. The position regarding judicial immunity has been well set out in a number of related decisions and it is not necessary to repeat it here. (See, for example ADJs 9069, 9102, 1105 and 14549). The position regarding the immunity from suit of the statutory employment tribunals has also been addressed in previous decisions, see for example ADJs 4824, 14768, 11410, 20717 and Appeal Decision DEC S2017-023).
The first obstacle is the complainant’s attempt to imply to this respondent some sort of liability for actions in respect of which there is immunity, or to suggest that the actions of the respondent contributed to the actions which are the source of his complaint. As a matter of both logic and law the respondent cannot acquire a form of retrospective liability for an alleged breach in respect of an action for which immunity exists. Suffice to say that in the decisions referred to above it was found that judicial decision making, and also the decision making at the statutory tribunals referred to, is not a service or facility available to the public and does not constitute a service as defined under the Equal Status Act 2000 as amended. A Judge in exercising judicial decision making is immune from suit. Submissions in respect of the related complaint were received from the Courts Service in which they stated that as the matters complained of relate to the conduct of court proceedings and they do not constitute a service as defined under the Equal Status Act 2000, this claim is misconceived as it is incorrectly based in law and that the exercise of judicial decision making is immune from suit. Section 22 of the Equal Status Act 2000 as amended provides ‘that the Director may dismiss a claim at any time if of opinion that it has been made in bad faith or is frivolous, vexatious or misconceived or relates to a trivial matter.’ The alleged conduct which is the source of this complaint relates to the conduct of a Court hearing. Judicial decision making, and the related conduct of court proceedings do not constitute a service or facility available to the public and does not constitute a service as defined under the Equal Status Act 2000 as amended. The following appears in ‘The Equal Status Acts 2000-2011, 2012 edition, Judy Walsh, Blackhall Publishing, at page 43: “Equivalent UK provisions have been subject to fairly extensive interpretation (McColgan, 2005, pp 255-285; Monaghan, 2007, pp 505-508). In a number of cases UK courts concluded that ‘services’ were confined to acts of similar kind to acts that might be carried out by a private person. Therefore, functions that are of a public law nature (i.e. enforcement, regulatory and control functions) have fallen outside the scope of that country’s non-discrimination legislation.” I find therefore that this claim is misconceived as it is incapable of achieving the desired outcome and the matter complained of is not a service as defined under the Act. Leaving aside the lack of any connection or liability between the current respondent and the matters complained of, the acts complained of are not amenable to are immune from suit. Section 22 of the Equal Status Act 2000 as amended provides for a complaint to be dismissed at any time if an opinion is formed that the complaint is misconceived. Therefore, I find that the complaint is misconceived and dismiss the complaint. |
Decision:
Section 25 of the Equal Status Acts, 2000 – 2015 requires that I make a decision in relation to the complaint in accordance with the relevant redress provisions under section 27 of that Act.
For the reasons set out above I find that complaint CA-11679-001 is misconceived and I dismiss the complaint. |
Dated: 02 December 2021
Workplace Relations Commission Adjudication Officer: Pat Brady
Key Words:
Immunity of statutory tribunal |