A Russian teenager who had her place on a summer camp cancelled following the invasion of Ukraine has been awarded €1,500 for racial discrimination.
Organisers must also offer her a place for free on next year's camp, and pay travel costs of up to €1,200.
If the 14-year-old decides not to attend, then they must make a second compensation payment of €1,500 to address "the impact of the discrimination on the minor".
The Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) heard that the summer camp's organisers feared that they would be breaking the sanctions regime imposed on Russia if they took the girl’s course fee.
In a decision published today, the tribunal ruled there was "no basis" for that claim.
Neither the teenager nor the summer theatre camp was identified in the ruling, which dismissed the organisers’ claim that other children could "create difficulties" for the girl "solely because she is Russian".
This was "a case of personal bias being transferred to another", the WRC found, "and then using that person as an excuse for their own bias".
Teenager 'cancelled'
In January 2022, the girl’s father had booked a place and paid a deposit on a three-week summer course at the children’s theatre school, which was set to take place last July.
On 24 May, a representative of the girl’s family inquired about paying the balance of the course fee, only to be told that the school "intended to cancel the booking, referring to the sanctions against Russia due to the war in Ukraine", the tribunal heard.
After that phone call, the representative sent a follow-up email.
"You said that you are concerned with the emotional wellbeing of all the kids in the camp, although you don’t appear to have considered the emotional effect on [the complainant] of being 'cancelled’ like this," it read.
The course organisers confirmed their position by email on 30 May, writing: "Unfortunately at this time, while current European sanctions are in place, we cannot accept any booking from Russia".
In his evidence, the summer camp organiser said that his phone conversation with the girl’s representative "got heated", with the representative going on a "rant".
He said that there was "a reference to Equal Status legislation", adding that he had asked the family’s representative whether she was "threatening" him.
'Children can be cruel'
The camp organiser emphasised that they felt that they "could not guarantee" the girl’s wellbeing in the camp.
"Children can be cruel," he said, and with a group of young people staying together, "things can happen".
The course organisers had not taken professional advice on this aspect of the matter, but thought that they "must be breaking sanctions" if they went ahead with the booking.
The girl's representative, who appeared before the WRC in April and June, said that the organisers’ concerns about the girl’s wellbeing were "secondary", and that the camp's "main wish" was "to do something to support Ukraine".
"Had she been any nationality other than Russian, the complainant would have been allowed to participate in the camp," the representative claimed.
In her decision on the case, adjudicating officer Janet Hughes concluded that there was "no basis" for the "interpretation" that EU sanctions relating to Russia's invasion of Ukraine applied to the teenager.
Nor was there any evidence to suggest that other children might "create difficulties" for the teenager "solely because she is Russian… [by] developing a negative connection between her and the war in Ukraine".
"Assumptions were being made by the respondents about the other participants based, I suggest, on their own attitudes to the war in Ukraine and by extension Russians in general," Ms Hughes wrote.
While she "was not implying for an instant" that the camp organisers held any "discriminatory bias", it is "reasonable to conclude" that this was "a case of personal bias being transferred to another… and then using that person as an excuse for their own bias".
'Made up their mind'
Rather than sharing their fears with the complainant and her father, the organisers "simply made up their mind and linked the refusal to allow participation to the nationality of the minor to the war in Ukraine".
The adjudicator ruled that the camp's refusal to give the teenager a place had breached the Equal Status Act, and ordered the organisers to pay €1,500 in compensation to the complainant in the first instance.
Ms Hughes also directed that the girl be given a place for the girl for free on the three-week camp in 2024, along with travel costs of up to €1,200, if she chose to accept it.
If not, the camp organisers will be required to pay a second sum of €1,500 compensation.
"These forms of redress should make it clear to the minor that she was unfairly and unreasonably connected with events clearly not of her making," Ms Hughes wrote.
The adjudicator gave the girl 30 days do decide whether to take the camp place in 2024 or the extra compensation.
