The complainant lodged his complaint with the Tribunal on 1 March 2012. He made multiple allegations relating to his conditions of employment that roughly break down into three groups, those relating to 2010, those relating to 2011 and 2012 until the date of his complaint, and those that occurred after the date of his complaint that were included in his submission to the Tribunal.

The complainant’s allegations related to issues such as the treatment of his various applications for leave including Christmas leave, not being permitted to wear runners and not being permitted to go home when sick.

 In respect of the first group of allegations, the Equality Officer found that the complainant had not established a link between the 2010 allegations and those that occurred later and therefore the first group of allegations were out of time.

When considering the allegations in the third group, those that occurred after the lodgement of the complaint and included in the submission of 2013, the Equality officer was satisfied that they all related to the Race ground. She stated “It is not envisaged that a complainant should have to submit an additional claim form for each and every alleged incident of discrimination”. She was satisfied that the respondent was on notice of the allegations having received the submission and therefore found she had jurisdiction to investigate them. However, in Determination EDA1124, Ann Hurley v County Cork VEC and in EDA122 A School and a Worker, the Labour Court stated that matters arising after the date of the lodgement of the complaint were not comprehended by the complaint, could not be regarded as part of the complaint, but may have probative value in respect of those incidents that could.

The Equality Officer’s conclusion that she had jurisdiction is important as only three of all of the complainant’s allegations were upheld. Two of them, occurring in December 2012 and January 2013, occurred after the date of the lodgement of the complaint. The third matter upheld relates to incidents that occurred in October 2011 and June 2012 when the complainant made a complaint of discrimination, along with other colleagues, to a manager in October 2011 and raised it a second time on his performance review in June 2012. The respondent could not offer an explanation as to why neither complaint was actioned. The Equality Officer found that as no action was taken this established a prima facie case of discrimination on the grounds of race which the respondent failed to rebut. While, of course, it is inadvisable for an employer to ignore such serious allegations, there appears to be no reference to how others were treated in similar circumstances.

Having considered some 10 allegations the Equality Officer concluded that the remainder did not amount to discrimination of him on the race ground. She referred to Ms. Angela Carr and the Financial Services Ombudsman v EBS Building Society ([2013] IEHC182) where the judge stated that it was not necessary “to deal on a point by point basis with every argument made by the complainant”.

The complainant was awarded €12,000 for the discrimination in the three matters upheld.

Why is this case of interest?

• The Equality Officer decided that incidents that occurred after the complaint was lodged were encompassed by the complaint. The respondent’s failure to handle an employee’s complaint has been upheld as discriminatory.
• Regardless of whether this is ultimately upheld employers should ensure that managers know how to respond to such allegations.