The health service has been ordered to reconsider its recruitment policies and pay €1,000 for ageist discrimination after an external recruiter rejected a veteran addiction clinic worker's job application because he lacked a specific healthcare assistant cert.
The worker, Anthony Cummins, had spent 22 years on weekend shifts doing part-time relief cover for permanent staff at the National Drugs Treatment Centre in Dublin city centre, the Workplace Relations Commission was told – but had an application for a permanent job there rejected at a preliminary stage last year.
In finding that there had been indirect discrimination on the grounds of age, the WRC noted that local HSE managers had allowed experienced care workers without the cert being to continue their duties pending training because it was the "only realistic option" to keep some care centres open.
However, in Mr Cummins’ case, it seemed his application for a permanent role had been "automatically" rejected by an external recruiter acting on the HSE’s instructions -- "more than likely", the WRC found, because the recruiter was "sifting" the applications with software.
Giving evidence to the employment tribunal, Mr Cummins said the "blanket insistence" on staff having the cert was "completely discriminatory against long-serving staff who have clearly displayed the ability to carry out the role to everyone’s complete satisfaction".
"Most long-standing staff would be much older than potential new recruits and much less likely to have achieved qualifications such as the Level 5," he added.
He told the tribunal he had been working a "very challenging role" doing part-time relief cover at the clinic since July 2000 and had never been subject to a complaint about either his standard of work or his attendance.
Denying discrimination, the HSE argued that the requirement for a HCCA Level 5 course had been "well canvassed" throughout the organisation and was "well known" to Mr Cummins.
The recruitment competitions had been carried out under "fully published national frameworks" and there was "absolutely no suggestion of anything amiss".
WRC adjudicator Michael McEntee wrote in his decision that it was "hard to rebut" Mr Cummins’ view that the "rigid insistence on the HCCA Level 5" amounted to the employer overlooking "22 years’ unblemished service".
Mr McEntee wrote that it was clear from his investigation of the matter with the parties that "a lot of operational issues" had been caused in HSE-linked care agencies because of an "overly strict requirement" for the certification.
Both management and unions had been forced to turn a "Nelson’s eye" to keep some centres open by leaving older, experienced staff in place without the qualification, he added.
In Mr Cummins’ case, the HSE had acknowledged the worker’s experience was "invaluable", the adjudicator added.
"The adjudication finding has to be that the respondent could not rebut the complaint that indirect discrimination, albeit possibly inadvertently, had taken place," Mr McEntee wrote.
Mr Cummins had told him that "large financial compensation was not his objective" and that while he was still working in the drug clinic he had found other work in the public sector at a "much-enhanced salary", the adjudicator wrote.
On that basis, Mr McEntee awarded him €1,000 for the effects of indirect discrimination.
He also directed the HSE’s central HR department to "carefully consider the question of how prior learning and relevant work experience… is considered in determining what are qualifying qualifications for general assistant positions".
"The 'one size fits all’ HCCA Level 5 policy needs closer examination," he added.
