A vegetable processing and packaging business paid only a 5 cent per hour Sunday allowance to a minimum wage worker who was required to regularly work 15 hour days.
At the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), Adjudicator Catherine Byrne has ordered Co Monaghan based vegetable processing firm, Sillis Green Veg Ltd to pay Ms Aldona Pileckiene €15,000 compensation for two breaches of the Organisation of Working Time Act and one breach of the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act.
Ms Byrne has found that Aldona Pileckiene's working conditions relating to Sunday work and her excessively long working hours "resulted in serious contraventions" of the OWT Act.
On behalf of Ms Pileckiene, Joe Smith BL, instructed by Elena Gray of Barry Healy & Co Solicitors, told the WRC hearing that Ms Pileckiene started work at 4.00am and sometimes 3.00am and was required to work "until finished" meaning that she regularly worked 13, 14 or 15 hours a day.
In evidence, Lithuanian national, Ms Pileckiene said that a busy week could be her working 65, 66 or 67 hours and the longest she ever worked was 75 hours per week and sometimes she said she worked 17 or 18 hours a day.
In her ruling, Ms Byrne has ordered Sillis Green Veg to pay Ms Pileckiene €10,000 over its failure to prevent her from working in excess of 48 hours a week.
Ms Byrne said that it was "most disturbing" that Ms Pileckiene persistently asked not to be rostered for such long hours.
Ms Byrne stated that Ms Pileckiene - who worked for the firm from 2013 to March 2020 - had family responsibilities and she was suffering from a hernia.
She said: "Not surprisingly, her illness and her long hours at work were making her feel depressed."
Ms Byrne pointed out that all the hours were paid at the minimum rate of €10.10, apart from the 5 cents allowance per hour on Sundays, with no overtime premium.
Ms Byrne stated that no evidence was given of any action taken by the employer to ensure that the health of employees was not put at risk due to long hours.
The business employs 58 people and the majority of the workforce are foreign and Ms Pileckiene’s job was to clean vegetables.
In response to the firm’s failure to pay a reasonable Sunday allowance, Ms Byrne directed Sillis Green Veg to pay Ms Pileckiene €2,000.
Payroll Manager with the firm, Mairéad Flanagan, told the hearing that to compensate for working on Sundays, employees receive an additional 5 cents per hour.
Under cross-examination from Mr Smith, Ms Flanagan described the Sunday premium of 5 cents per hour as "not as fair as it could be."
In relation to Ms Pileckiene's claim of being penalised under the Health, Safety and Welfare at Work Act, Mr Smith stated that when Ms Pileckiene advised her managers that she had a hernia and that she was depressed, she was told that she had to continue to work.
In her findings on this aspect of her claim, Ms Byrne has ordered the firm to pay Ms Pileckiene €3,000 after finding that she was penalised "when she was intimidated into continuing to work excessively long hours".
Ms Byrne stated that Ms Pileckiene was not dismissed or threatened with dismissal, but she was told that she could leave if she didn’t accept the long hours she was required to work.
She stated that the failure to give any consideration to Ms Pileckiene’s request to work 40 hours a week, and being told where the door is, "seems to me to meet the definition of intimidation as intended by the Health & Safety Act".
Ms Byrne stated that Ms Pileckiene was attempting to exert her entitlement to safer working conditions.
Ms Byrne said: "It is not an easy decision for a foreign national in a rural town to move jobs and the effect of telling her that she could leave if she wasn’t happy was effectively telling her that she had very little choice but to keep working. She did not contemplate simply going home after working eight hours, but, at a risk to her health and welfare, she continued to work up to 15 hours a day."
At hearing, the firm stated that Ms Pileckiene never made a complaint under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act and if a complaint had been made, the firm would have investigated it immediately and thoroughly.
The company contended that Ms Pileckiene failed to satisfy the evidential burden of proving that the firm breached the OWT Act in respect of Sunday working, excessive working hours, night working and public holidays.
