{"id":405619,"date":"2026-03-26T21:55:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T21:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/405619\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T21:55:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T21:55:11","slug":"solicitor-claims-he-was-firefighting-as-staff-left-over-being-denied-working-from-home-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/405619\/","title":{"rendered":"Solicitor claims he was \u2018firefighting\u2019 as staff left over being denied working from home \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A solicitor made redundant less than two years after a Dublin<\/a> law firm bought out his legal practice claimed he was stuck \u201cfirefighting\u201d to keep clients instead of drumming up new business because office staff were leaving after being denied remote work arrangements. <\/p>\n

The solicitor, Joseph McNally, found himself in \u201cfirefighting mode\u201d as clients of his former practice in Ballymun were phoning him \u201cupset\u201d and \u201cirate\u201d after he passed over responsibility for day-to-day case work upon the merger of his firm with Ferrys LLP in early 2023, his barrister has said. <\/p>\n

A partner at the firm has denied this was the case. <\/p>\n

McNally is pursuing a complaint under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 against Ferrys Solicitors LLP, alleging a \u201csham\u201d redundancy in October 2024. The company denies the claim and says McNally was let go following a proper redundancy process, having turned down alternative work.<\/p>\n

McNally\u2019s legal team has said their client agreed to the merger on the basis that he would be made a partner at Ferrys within three years. The company\u2019s position is that McNally had pitched the use of digital marketing to secure new clients, but this failed to yield substantial fee-earning business. <\/p>\n

At the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC)<\/a>, barrister Tiernan Lowey continued his cross-examination of Ferrys partner Barry O\u2019Donoghue on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Lowey pointed to an email from his client\u2019s business development work being \u201champered by staff shortages\u201d at its Ballymun branch, where McNally\u2019s files and former staff had been sent. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019ll be my client\u2019s evidence that the staff shortages arose because … they did not want to accommodate remote working and they wanted them to work at the office,\u201d counsel said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not what happened,\u201d O\u2019Donoghue said. \u201cThere was no dispute with any of the existing staff in Ballymun in relation to their terms and conditions,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

He said a trainee solicitor had moved on to pursue \u201ca different area of law\u201d. O\u2019Donoghue said he thought \u201cgeographical reasons\u201d may have been the reason that a senior administrator McNally had called his \u201cright hand\u201d had left, he added. <\/p>\n

\"\"Are Government’s fuel measures betting on a quick resolution to the conflict in Iran?<\/p>\n

The only solicitor left in the practice \u201ccontinues to work remotely for most of the week\u201d, he added. <\/p>\n

Lowey put it to O\u2019Donoghue that seven office staff had left and Ballymun was \u201chaemorrhaging staff\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cA number of staff left, but a number of staff were hired,\u201d the witness said. <\/p>\n

Lowey said the three staff hired in \u201cwould not have been a fair substitute for those seven staff, who\u2019d had a lot of experience working in the Ballymun office\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cJoe wasn\u2019t dealing with files on a day-to-day basis,\u201d O\u2019Donoghue said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy client will completely reject that assertion. His evidence will be that owing to the fact you were haemorrhaging staff … he was forced into dealing with old clients to ensure they were retained, and that is where his attentions were by necessity drawn,\u201d Lowey said, referencing a memo sent by the complainant in late 2023. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat is simply not the case, Mr Lowey,\u201d the witness said. <\/p>\n

Lowey said the complainant \u201chad to work in firefighting mode\u201d to retain the clients \u2013 something the previous administrative staff could have managed themselves. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis arose because clients were complaining, they were concerned that there was no movement on their files, and he will say it\u2019s because Ferrys were not doing the heavy lifting,\u201d Lowey said. <\/p>\n

Adjudicator Christina Ryan asked Lowey to point out \u201cwhich clients\u201d were involved. Lowey said there were \u201chundreds of files\u201d his client could be referring to in the memo. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Donoghue said that to say \u201chundreds of files\u201d were involved was \u201ccompletely outrageous and simply untrue\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cI would ask that Mr Lowey retract that comment, because it\u2019s completely unjustified,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

\u201cI will retract the reference to \u2018hundreds\u2019, unequivocally. I don\u2019t know the exact figure \u2013 a large number of clients,\u201d Lowey said. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t have a figure, so you should unreservedly withdraw the word \u2018large\u2019,\u201d O\u2019Donoghue said. <\/p>\n

Quoting from the memo, Lowey said his client had set out that he was \u201cleft to deal with a lot of the old clients\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey were ringing through to my work mobile. They were confused because the office name had changed, they were very upset, irate in some cases, because they hadn\u2019t had calls returned and didn\u2019t know what was happening with their files,\u201d McNally had written. <\/p>\n

Lowey asked the witness whether he was aware of what his client had raised. O\u2019Donoghue said he didn\u2019t think he was, and that the joint managing partners, Padraic Ferry and Deborah Crowley, had been liaising with the complainant. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not aware there was any significant level of irate clients or dissatisfied clients … that would have required any significant amount of time being spent by Joe,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cDo you not believe that issues were being raised by a lot of old clients?\u201d Lowey asked the witness later. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t accept that as of October 2023 that the level of client engagement required of Joe was such that it was negatively impacting his ability to perform his contractual duties,\u201d O\u2019Donoghue said. <\/p>\n

The case, before adjudication officer Christina Ryan, has been adjourned to May. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A solicitor made redundant less than two years after a Dublin law firm bought out his legal practice…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68793,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,52,18,19,17,80,81],"class_list":{"0":"post-405619","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-dublin","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-work","14":"tag-workplace-relations-commission"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405619"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405619\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}