AN ACTING FOREMAN with a local authority has had an appeal against disciplinary procedures taken against him, after he allegedly assaulted a co-worker, dismissed at the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC).
The man in question had been first employed in the housing section of the authority as a plumber in 2009. He was promoted to the grade of acting foreman in September 2012.
The disciplinary action taken against the man related to an alleged incident in May of 2017 in which he was accused by a co-worker, a carpenter, of pushing him down a staircase at the housing depot where they worked and then kicking him in the head while he lay prone.
While this incident, which saw the carpenter hospitalised and a complaint made to the police, was being investigated, it emerged that the foreman had also allegedly threatened another co-worker in September 2016, after he (the foreman) had borrowed the council van assigned to the other man without leave, an action which saw him given a verbal warning.
The council elected to investigate both these incidents as one, with the end result being a final written warning for the foreman, the loss of his foreman status, a 10-day suspension without pay, and an involuntary transfer out of the depot where he had been based.
Appeal
The man subsequently appealed that disciplinary procedure to the WRC, stating that he had been “subjected to a disciplinary and appeal process that was fundamentally flawed and failed to adhere to the most basic of fair procedures”.
He said that the allegation of assault had been false, and that the issue surrounding the unauthorised use of the van had been dealt with comprehensively at the time.
He further said that he had not been provided with the full information regarding the position of that van after it had been taken in order that he might respond before the investigation took place.
In response to that appeal, the local authority made clear that the most serious issue it had uncovered in its investigation related to the threatening behaviour of the foreman towards the man whose assigned van he had borrowed outside working hours in September 2016.
It said that the foreman’s conduct with regard to that incident had represented ‘gross misconduct’, hence the severity of the punishment meted out.
‘Witch hunt’
In considering the various submissions, adjudicating officer Catherine Byrne said that she did not accept the complainant’s assertion that the entire process amounted to a ‘witch hunt’ as there was no evidence to back up such a claim.
She said that fair procedures had not been breached in the initial investigation as there was “no evidence that he or his trade union representative looked for a copy of the report or that the management refused to provide it in advance of” a disciplinary meeting in July 2017.
She said that it was “reasonable for the council to conclude that an assault occurred in May 2017 during which the complainant pushed the carpenter and he fell down the stairs, suffering certain injuries”, and that the authority need only have “a reasonable belief that it occurred” as opposed to a requirement to prove the incident had happened beyond a reasonable doubt.
On foot of these conclusions, Byrne stated that it would not have been excessive had the local authority sacked the foreman for his transgressions, and as such the result of the disciplinary process should stand.
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