in today's video I want to talk about something that might be of concern to
employees in particular but obviously it'll be of indirect consequence to
employers
I have seen on my Facebook page my facebook page has nearly 20,000 fans or
followers or whatever they're called on Facebook and I've seen a lot of comments
about WRC the workplace relations commission being biased essentially
being biased towards the employer and the employee is not going to get a fair
shake won't get a fair hearing I've seen comments like WRC is crap of employers
weapons a complete share of pricks told me I was off my head to go home the
WRC weren't much use to Tesco staff biggest mistake anyone can make is to go
to the WRC kangaroo court at best the WRC are worthless they weren't much use to
me either absolutely wasted my time you might be
on the fence about bringing a claim to the WRC the workplace relations
commission you may think from reading comments such as those that you're not
going to get a fair hearing or that it's biased towards employers I'm here to
tell you that that's not the case I am a solicitor and I have no great axe to
grind for either employer or employee or for the workplace relations commission or
the labor court I simply do a job I represent my client to the best of my
ability my client is either an employer or an employee if they pay I represent them
and I do my best but I can assure you from my experience that the Workplace
Relations Commission hearings are fair the adjudicators know the law and
they will give you a fair hearing provided that your case stands on its own
two feet provided you can prove the facts of your case provided you can
prove a breach of the law or a breach of a statutory entitlement or a breach of
your contract or a breach of some right of yours as per the contract of
employment but essentially disappointed people will inevitably feel hard done by
just feel that the deck was loaded against them just feel that they weren't going
to get a fair hearing at the WRC let us say that's not true that is not
the case the WRC will and have recently in fact
the two cases that I have written about on my website employment rates ireland
dot com I'm looking there at two recent cases one of which I was involved in and
where my client the complainant was brought a claim for sexual harassment
and was awarded 30,000 euros another case relatively recently as well
decision published in the last few weeks the employee was awarded 38,000 euros
for indirect discrimination I've written about both of these cases on my website
employment rights Ireland dot com if you care to go to the website you will see
the decisions themselves there's a link in the blog post to the actual decisions
but the bottom line is that if you have a case if you have a legitimate claim if
there is a legitimate breach of an employment right and provided you can
present your case well and provided you prove the facts and prove the law in
other words prove that there's been a breach if you can do that then you will
win your case and there's no question of bias now from time to time you may get a
decision from an adjudicator with which you won't agree or that you might think
was irrational or perverse but by and large the decisions I find are rationale
are well grounded in logic well grounded in the law and most or all of
practically all of the hearings I've been involved in have been fair and both
sides both parties have had an opportunity to present a case and the
decision then is the decision inevitably though if somebody brings a claim and
they lose they're going to have a particular view they are going to be disappointed
that's understandable they are going to be dismayed that's understandable but
if you were playing football or playing hurling or playing soccer or playing
rugby or playing anything and you lose then the first thing you might
consider doing is blaming the ref but on mature reflection as it were you might
look back and think well maybe it wasn't all down to the ref maybe it was we
weren't good enough maybe we didn't play well enough on the day and it's a
similar situation with the WRC and bringing your claim
you may have facts and the law on your side or you may not you may have a sense
of grievance or unfairness but you may not be able to prove legal entitlement
that has not been granted to you or a breach of your entitlements breach of
your rights you can't do that then inevitably if the WRC adjudicator is
going to be fair they will have to find in favor of the employer so that's the
situation I hope you find this video useful if you do you might give us a
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watching