in this video I'm gonna take a look at bullying in the workplace and what the
legal remedies are for bullying one of the most common complaints that I meet
when I meet employees all the time is a complaint about bullying but quite
frankly a lot of employees are not entirely sure what constitutes bullying
from a legal perspective and you need to be very very careful before you embark
on any course of action in relation to bullying that the behavior about which
you complain is and does constitute bullying now bullying is repeated
inappropriate behavior that offends the dignity your dignity in the workplace
that's essentially what it is but it is repeated it is persistent and it does
more it must offend your dignity in the workplace management rough management or
a one-off incident or some sort of a slight or perhaps a one off shouting
match or something like that or a disciplinary procedure or a grievance
procedure that goes wrong doesn't necessarily constitute bullying so you
just need to be aware of that at the outset and double-check that the
behavior you're talking about does constitute bullying if that's the case
then we'll take a look at the remedies the legal remedies for bullying so
firstly you need to understand that there's no codified anti-bullying
legislation in Ireland there is a number of legal avenues but there's no specific
piece of legislation on the statute books that says bullying is an offence
you might find that hard to believe you may be surprised to learn that but
that is the position there's no codified codified anti-bullying legislation so if
you're bullied by an employer or if you're bullied by a colleague a work
colleague you do have a fair degree of protection insofar as the employer can
be held vicariously liable for the acts of the fellow employee colleague in
addition obviously to being liable for his own acts if the employer is the one
who is bullying you before you do anything though before you
embark on any complaint or any course of action or any claim running legal
proceedings you should invoke the internal grievance procedures the
anti-bullying procedures in the workplace in the first instance so you
should exhaust whatever procedure may be in the workplace it may be a grievance
procedure you use it may be an anti-bullying procedure you use it may
be a dignity at work policy or procedure that you use but you do need
to use internal procedures first and you do need to exhaust those procedures
after that then the legal remedies for bullying would include suing the
employer for breach of contract that is you are entitled to enjoy a certain
degree of protection in the workplace in order to carry out your duties and do
your job there's an implied term of trust and confidence that both employer
has in the employee and the employee is entitled to have in the employer so
breach of contract would be one avenue for a bullying situation the second
would be a negligence claim this essentially is a personal injuries
action so where you have suffered bullying and you've then suffered an
injury a psychological or psychiatric injury as a result of that bullying then
you're gonna have a claim for negligence against the employer and that will
involve probably or almost certainly a claim to the injuries board in the first
instance and then the injuries board won't deal with it because it's a
psychological or psychiatric injury that you are claiming the injuries board will
simply issue you with a letter of authorization to bring a claim for the
personal injury and that will be essentially a claim for negligence so
you need to prove that the employer was negligent in the way that you are
treated in the workplace essentially you need to prove a number of things the
most important things you need to prove would be a that you've suffered an
actual psychological or psychiatric injury as a result of the carry on in
the workplace as a result of the treatment that you've suffered in the
workplace number two you need to prove that that injury was suffered as a
result of the negligence of the employer so there's a number
of things you need to prove but they are the most important things one you
suffered an injury and two it was the negligence of the employer that allowed
that injury occur and therefore the employer is liable you can also bring
some sort of a claim under health and safety legislation - for example the
workplace relations commission or indeed you can sue for breach of contract and
include a breach of health and safety law the common law obligation to provide
a safe place of work and a statutory breach of the safely health and welfare
and work Act of 2005 or whatever year it was if a bring it bring a claim also
under equality legislation for harassment the harassment is slightly
different from bullying insofar as it's bullying that's kind of grounded in one
of the discriminatory grounds and there's nine grounds of discrimination
so that's a harassment claim you could also bring a claim for constructive
dismissal in other words you could put up with the bullying for so long and
then you simply have had enough remember how stated that you do need to
use internal grievance procedures first you do need to exhaust them and after
that then you may be able to ground a successful claim for constructive
dismissal if after exhausting internal procedures you leave the job and bring a
claim against the employer for constructive dismissal on the basis that
you cannot be expected to put up with it any longer and that the conduct of the
employer in failing to protect you essentially is completely unreasonable
so unreasonable as to allow you to treat the contract of employment at
an end I would advise you to get legal advice choosing the best cause of action
the best cause of legal action in your case is critically important the venues
as I said that are open to you would include the civil courts the workplace
Relations Commission the labor court and the personal injuries board choosing the
wrong type of action or the wrong venue will cost you in the long run I would
caution you though about the workplace Relations Commission and the labor court
in so far as the referral is there the claims they're under bullying under a
bullying heading as it were is limited enough insofar as you're essentially
bringing a claim that the employer has failed to
implement the dignity at work procedure or policy in the workplace and
the likelihood is that your claim there is going to be under the Industrial
Relations act 1969 you're going to be looking for a recommendation that the
employer has failed to use the policies and procedures in the workplace to
provide you with protection but the award that you may end up with could be
limited enough hope you find this video useful if you do you can give it the
thumbs up down below I would appreciate that and my contact details are there on
the screen you may also be interested in subscribing to my youtube channel forgot
to say on employment rights Ireland.com website that you see there on the
screen there's a huge amount of information about employment law in
Ireland on that website it's completely free a lot of it has to do with bullying
as well and various cases involving bullying and people who were bullied and
personal injury claims and so on and so forth the other website that you see
their business and legal doneghy is my solicitors website that doesn't deal
with just employment law it these are all aspects of Eros law including
personal injury claim his property and so forth