{"id":52393,"date":"2025-09-09T07:06:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T07:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/52393\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T07:06:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T07:06:08","slug":"retail-worker-sacked-after-complaining-about-lack-of-washroom-wins-compensation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/52393\/","title":{"rendered":"Retail worker sacked after complaining about\u00a0lack of washroom wins compensation"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), adjudicator Penelope McGrath has ordered GB Agencies Galway Limited, trading as YaYa, to pay compensation of \u20ac7,500 to Fiona Bird for being penalised under Section 28 of the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005.<\/p>\n

In her ruling, Ms McGrath states that she is \u201cabsolutely satisfied that the abrupt termination of the complainant\u2019s employment was an act of penalisation which has had a detrimental effect on the complainant\u201d.<\/p>\n

\n

The employer claimed that Ms Bird was dismissed for poor performance<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In total, Ms McGrath has ordered GB Agencies Galway Ltd to pay \u20ac9,390 to Ms Bird for being penalised for making the HSA complaint and for other workplace legislation breaches.<\/p>\n

The employer claimed that Ms Bird was dismissed for poor performance, as her sales were not as good as her other five colleagues\u2019. However, Ms McGrath dismissed this as a reason for Mr Bird\u2019s dismissal.<\/p>\n

Ms McGrath stated she did not accept the employer\u2019s explanation for the termination \u201cwhich I perceive to be an attempt to shore up a highly problematic dismissal after the event\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ms Bird had worked for Pamela Scott for up to 10 years in an outlet in Stillorgan before being asked to work for a new YaYa ladies\u2019 boutique in D\u00fan Laoghaire.<\/p>\n

One of the directors of GB Agencies Galway Ltd explained he had gone into partnership with a Dutch lifestyle brand, YaYa.<\/p>\n

Ms Bird stated there were the inevitable start-up problems that needed to be ironed out and the biggest issue was the lack of a staff bathroom onsite, which also meant that there was no onsite hand washing facility.<\/p>\n

\"Stock<\/p>\n

Stock image<\/p>\n

Today’s News in 90 Seconds – Tuesday, September 9<\/p>\n

A director of the firm, Gerard Burke, gave evidence that he had concentrated on the shop and that the back area was still unfinished when they opened up the shop just before Christmas.<\/p>\n

The employer had made an arrangement with the coffee shop next door so that his staff could use the public bathroom available to customers as and when required.<\/p>\n

\n

The installation of a staff bathroom should have happened as part of the re-fit<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mr Bird said that this was not always convenient or satisfactory and Ms McGrath stated that she accepted \u201cthat this was not a particularly dignified solution to the lack of onsite facilities\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ms McGrath said: \u201cIt seems to me that the installation of a staff bathroom should have happened as part of the shop re-fit and not seen as an added extra to be dealt with down the line.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cThe issue was not given any priority. The complainant says that for personal and\/or health reasons she needed access to a bathroom and was not happy to have to go next door and queue for the facility. This went on for about five months.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms McGrath says Ms Bird confirmed she had eventually raised the issue with the HSA to determine if she was within her rights to be upset about this issue.<\/p>\n

Ms McGrath stated the HSA took it upon themselves to follow up on this issue and a notice was sent in early 2023 to the company director Mr Burke.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), adjudicator Penelope McGrath has ordered GB Agencies Galway Limited, trading as YaYa,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,52,18,19,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-52393","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"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52393","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=52393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}