Source: https://www.legal-island.ie/events-ie/annual-review-of-irish-employment-law-2020/
Timestamp: 2020-08-10 09:25:01
Document Index: 343935492

Matched Legal Cases: ['art 1', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'CJEU ', 'art 2']

Annual Review of Irish Employment Law
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Get to Know Us: Familiarise yourself with the functions of our online event to ensure you maximise return on your investment. Scott Alexander, Head of Learning & Development, Legal Island.
Introduction and Welcome: Seònaid Ó Murchadha, Disability Employment Specialist and Pat Brady, Director, Workplace Solutions, and WRC Adjudication Officer.
Review of the Year (Part 1 – 2020 Vision) with Jennifer Cashman, Partner, Ronan Daly Jermyn
It’s not just been about Covid-19 this year. Employment law developments in Ireland have continued in 2020 – albeit they are coloured by the spectre of Covid-19. Jennifer delivers her annual round-up of the key employment law developments in 2020 not covered elsewhere in detail in this programme and sets out the trends that have emerged from the lockdown onwards.
NOTE: The contents of this session may change to reflect what have been the most important and latest developments at November 2020.
Comfort Break – Send in Your Questions or partake of a quick bit of networking.
Q&A with Jennifer Cashman – Jennifer answers queries from the audience.
Break and Networking – get yourself some refreshments and visit exhibitors or network with speakers and delegates.
Homeworking and Remote Working – Employment Law and HR Considerations. Remote and homeworking are here to stay for many of us, regardless of a return to work. A consultation seeking the public’s views on flexible working as part of Future Jobs Ireland was launched in December 2019 and a further consultation was launched in July 2020. The programme for government in June 2020 included a proposal to mandate public sector employers, colleges, and other public bodies to move to 20% home and remote working in 2021 and provide incentives for private sector employers to do likewise. Regardless of anyone’s opinion on flexible working last year, the lockdown from Covid-19 let the homeworking genie out of the bottle and it is not going back in. But homeworking and other remote working brings risks, for employers and employees alike, along with benefits. In this session, Bláthnaid Evans, Partner, Leman Solicitors, discusses four key issues of homeworking for employers - Equality; Health and Safety/Wellbeing; Data Protection; and Training – and how to minimise risks from same.
Mind Your Language: Useful Words for Reducing Conflict. We all have choices when it comes to the words, we use but most of us speak without actively considering the impact they might have on others. Some words and phrases can have a 'greenhousing' effect on conflict, allowing open discussions to flourish without rancour, in an atmosphere of positivity. Others cause people to shrivel up or become aggressive. Suppose your boss or a colleague has a great idea that you think is, well, not so great. Michelle Halloran, Principal Consultant, Human Resource Management Services, focuses on language that reduces conflict and defensiveness and will help you get your message across without causing an argument.
Q&A with Bláthnaid Evans
Q&A with Michelle Halloran
Roundtable and Panel Discussion: Our two session leads explain why you should attend their session, as they pitch for your presence in their roundtable discussion.
Employer Branding as a Recruitment Tool. Employer brand describes an employer's reputation as a place to work, and their employee value proposition, as opposed to the more general corporate brand reputation and value proposition to customers. Join our speaker, as he discusses the value of employer branding, and how to use it effectively, with our panel of guests.
Engaging Remote, Home and Hybrid Workers – Maximising Employee Engagement in the New World of Agile and Remote Working Schedules. Many employees, particularly those providing non-physical services, will continue to work from home or a remote location, and at times to suit their domestic circumstances, for the foreseeable future. Engagement and motivation are so important to organisational development and, when done properly, they can be incredibly powerful and effective in promoting the employer brand, recruiting and retaining employees and building sustainable organisational growth. Emer Hinphey, Managing Partner, ThinkPeople, sets out the results of our survey into employer actions that have been used to motivate remote workers since lockdown began in March and discusses the results with our panel of experts.
Welcome Back and Summary. Introduction to Afternoon Sessions: Seònaid Ó Murchadha, Disability Employment Specialist, and Pat Brady, Director, Workplace Solutions and WRC Adjudication Officer.
Remote Workplace Investigations and Disciplinary Hearings: Gone are the days for many of inviting lots of employees to provide witness statements in person or bringing everyone together in one room for a disciplinary or grievance hearing. Dismissal hearings were never the easiest of things to do but remote investigations and hearings bring different problems, not least confidentiality and connection issues. On the other hand, there are some benefits, such as it being easier to find key words in soft copy documents and meetings can be recorded for cross-checking evidence. Caroline McEnery, HR Suite, give her top tips and provides a useful checklist for running remote investigations and hearings.
Exiting Employees – How to Compile the Best Exit Interview Questions, Create the Most Valuable Exit Interviews and Maintain Return on Investment in Employees All organisations need some employee turnover to stay healthy and many of us have had more employee turnover than we had hoped for this year. It’s much better that employees leave for good reasons e.g. retirement, to advance a career, for lifestyle choices. Exit interviews – if you ask the right questions and create the right conditions to encourage openness and honesty – can give you valuable information, even if the reason for leaving is, unfortunately, redundancy. Are certain managers driving employees away? You can help the managers change their style. Are many employees leaving for better pay and conditions? You can at least consider your employee value proposition and what needs to improve if you are to stem a hemorrhage of staff. Have your redundancy processes been well handled? But there is more you can do. We consider:
Which questions elicit the most valuable information
Why you should create an ‘alumni’ network of former employees
Why you should hold staying in touch days for former employees
Why you should inform former employees of developments and opportunities in your organization
How to respond to negative online reviews by former employees
The best approach if exit interviews highlight poor behaviour by colleagues or managers
Covert Recording in the 'Workplace' - When Might it be Lawful?
In July 2020, the CIPD published an extensive report into workplace technology. Amongst its key findings were:
• 45% of employees believe that monitoring is currently taking place in their workplace - wherever that might be.
• 86% believe that workplace monitoring and surveillance will increase in the future.
• 73% of employees feel that introducing workplace monitoring would damage trust between workers and their employers.
Of course, the other side of the coin is that it has never been easier in these days of remote working for employees to covertly record private and confidential meetings from wherever they are based. In this session, Adrian Twomey, Partner, Jacob and Twomey Solicitors, sets out when it will (and will not) be lawful for employers and employees to covertly record each other’s activities or interactions.
Minimising Risks from Redundancy Selection. Coronavirus killed many people. The policy of lockdown saved lives but led to a recession, the likes of which none of us have seen in our lifetime. Although some organisations have grown during the crisis, most organisations, if they haven’t closed completely, have had to make a number of staff redundant or have reduced their hours of work. Claims to the WRC will have increased at a seemingly exponential rate. Any redundancy selection process will have problems, but some are inherently riskier than others. And certain approaches and management styles can increase or reduce the number of challenges to the process. In this session, Ger Connolly, Partner, Mason Hayes & Curran, recommends specific actions designed to minimise the risks and costs of redundancy selection processes.
Q&A with Caroline McEnery and Adrian Twomey
Q&A with our speakers
EU and International Employment Rights Update: Almost all employment equality rights in Ireland are derived from EU legislation, as are many non-equality rights, such as working time. Therefore, employment cases decided at the CJEU have a huge influence on our domestic laws and often set a precedent that must be followed by courts in Ireland. Even the UK’s Supreme Court can have a persuasive impact on Ireland’s courts. And the European Court of Human Rights didn’t close down either this year. Michelle Ní Longáin, Employment Law Partner, ByrneWallace, provides an in-depth analysis of the year’s important international cases in the employment field. Cases include:
NH v Associazione Avvocatura per i diritti LGBTI [2020] CJEU (C-507/18) (Equality & Recruitment)
VL v Szpital Kliniczny et al [2020] CJEU (C–16/19) AG Opinion: (Discrimination against one group of disabled employees by comparison with the treatment of other disabled employees)
Ryanair Designated Activity Company v Országos Rendőr-főkapitányság [2020] CJEU (Case C-754/18) (residence card and visa requirements)
UO v Készenléti Rendőrség [2020] CJEU (C-211/19) (on-call duties)
QH v Varhoven kasatsionen sad na Republika Bulgaria [2020] CJEU (C-762/18) and CV v Iccrea Banca SpA [2020] CJEU (C-37/19) (Accrual of annual leave when reinstatement ordered)
López Ribalda and Others v Spain [2019] ECtHR (Video Surveillance)
NOTE: The contents of this session may change to reflect the most important and latest developments at November 2020.
Ethics at Work – An Employer’s Guide: in October 2019, the CIPD issued their ethics’ guide and argued through their new HR Profession Map that that the HR profession should be ethical by ‘Building trust by role-modelling ethical behaviour and applying principles and values consistently in decision-making.’ Since then we have seen a sea-change in the economy and the HR profession, thanks to the impact of policies on the Covid-19 pandemic. Where do the ethics of HR now lie and how might ethical behaviour become your employer brand? Our speaker explains.
Q&A with Michelle Ní Longáin
Q&A with our speaker.
Summary and Close: Seònaid Ó Murchadha, Disability Employment Specialist and Pat Brady, Director, Workplace Solutions and WRC Adjudication Officer.
Welcome back: To ensure you maximise return on your investment, Scott Alexander, Head of Learning & Development, Legal Island, discusses key lessons from yesterday’s sessions.
Introduction and Welcome: Marian Jennings, Law Lecturer, Technological University, Dublin, and Clive Byrne, Director of the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals, discuss the options for you to look forward to on the first day of our conference.
The Ireland Case Review 2020 and Key Next Steps. Ireland has a very active workplace adjudication and appeal system and those ‘judges’ now issue detailed and reasoned decisions. The superior courts have had to contend with a number of employment-related cases this year. Duncan Inverarity, Head of A&L Goodbody’s Employment Group, sets out why those cases are important for Ireland’s employers and what action should now be taken as a result. Cases include:
A Worker v Bus Eireann [2020] LCR 22196 (Internal Selection Process)
North Tipperary School Completion Programme v A Worker [2020] LCR22175 (Unfair Dismissal, Poor Performance)
Macrea Takeaway Limited v Mr Ioan Alin Andrei [2020] DWT201 (Working Time - Hours, Breaks and Holidays)
Alteration Centre v Ms Renata Uryn [2019] UDD1963 (Bias in Disciplinary Proceedings)
RCI Call Centre (Ireland) Ltd v Salah [2020] UDD202 (Unfair Dismissal)
NOTE: Subjects covered in this session may vary from those shown and will focus on the most important Irish cases by November.
Duncan Inverarity Answers Your Questions
Employer Liability for Covid-19 Infections: Under Section 8 of the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005, "Every employer shall ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the safety, health and welfare at work of his or her employees." This requirement was not written with the Covid-19 pandemic in mind, but it continues to apply, and employers will doubtless be held vicariously liable for outbreaks within the workforce. The HSA has increased inspection powers and employees will be encouraged to blow the whistle on poor safety practices. Certainly, litigation is inevitable, even for employers who think they are in a position to defend personal injury or negligence claims arising out alleged failure to comply with the above duty of care and the Covid-secure guidance under the Return to Work Safely Protocol. Deirdre Crowley is a partner in the Technology and Innovation, and Employment Groups in Matheson. In this session, Deirdre explains the risks and how to mitigate same by reference to case law.
Discrimination by Association – The Latest Equality Battleground in the New Normal. A hitherto little-known (and little used) provision under the Employment Equality Acts is ‘discrimination by association’. Discrimination by association happens when a person is treated less favourably simply because they are associated with or connected to another person who comes under the nine grounds.
In this session we will discuss what is and what isn’t discrimination by association, when it may be another form of discrimination or not discrimination at all. For example, we will consider scenarios such as where;
An employee can’t return to work because they have child-caring responsibilities
An employee says they cannot return to work because they have a family member who is cocooning/shielding
The employee has a family member who had Covid-19 but is now recovered
Colleen Cleary, Founder CC Solicitors, explains why, in the light of lockdown, homeworking options and the risks to health from Covid-19, claims of associated discrimination are likely to arise when employers refuse to allow flexible working or dismiss employees, or even threaten to dismiss employees based on their personal circumstances. Colleen also sets out how best to minimise risk and respond to allegations.
Deirdre Crowley Answers Your Questions
Coleen Cleary answers your questions
The D&I Roundtable – Experts Discuss the Future of Diversity and Inclusion – led by Barry Phillips BEM, Chairman, Legal Island. Join Barry and our panel of guest D&I experts as they discuss the big D&I questions of the day, including maximising the Covid19 D&I dividend; minimising the C-19 negative D&I impact; how to have safe discussions about sensitive D&I issues at work; and BLM and political discussions in the workplace – are some matters less emotive than others?
Calling Out the Boss – Standing Up for HR and an Ethical Approach to Business. A series of challenges on the bystander effect and psychological safety in the workplace. In this roundtable session we consider how to create a framework for ethical decision making. What would you do in these scenarios? What should you do in these scenarios?
Q. The CEO/MD criticizes a colleague in public or at a meeting. What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD suggests moving an employee that s/he does not rate. What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD suggests that profits need to be higher year-on-year, regardless of the effect on the environment? What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD demands that planned redundancies are kept secret until the last moment possible? What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD is accused of sexual harassment. What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD has a bullish and bullying temperament. What would you do? What should you do?
Q. The CEO/MD takes credit for other people’s hard work. What would you do? What should you do?
Delegates may join this session or listen in.
Welcome Back and Summary. Introduction to Afternoon Sessions:
Data Protection Update for Employers 2020. This has been a busy year for data protection issues and the lockdown has only added to the list. Our speaker, highlights a number of issues of importance to employers, including:
Updates from the DPC and enforcement action during/after the pandemic
Working from home: risks associated with employee behaviour, employee monitoring, managing supplier contracts;
Returning to work: health monitoring, contact tracing, adjustment on a phased basis, and mission creep as the emergency eases;
Cyber risks: increase in COVID-19 related scams, and risks in employee behaviour;
International Transfers and Brexit: transferring personal data to third countries, including the US, following the Schrems II decision.
How to Help Employees Handle Grief. It has been a difficult year for us all and many have suffered the sudden loss of a loved one or colleague. Or perhaps one of your colleagues has lost a loved one and you are uncertain what to say or how to approach them? Irish Cancer Society has experience of handling grief and our speaker gives delegates an insight into what approaches and supports help most and those that are likely to make matters worse for the unfortunate employee, particularly in these times of remote working and social distancing.
Comfort Break – Send in Your Questions
Review of the Year (Part 2 – Looking Forward to 2021) with Jennifer Cashman, Partner, Ronan Daly Jermyn
In her second lecture of the day, Jennifer considers the likely employment law developments that we’ll see in 2021 and what we can do now to mitigate risk and maximise opportunities. Brexit is an obvious, existential threat to many of us, as might be a new surge in Covid-19 cases, but there are some positives out there, if you care to look with Jennifer.
NOTE: The contents of this session may change to reflect the most important and latest developments expected for 2021 at November 2020.
Q&A with Jennifer Cashman
Summary and Close: Marian Jennings, Law Lecturer, Technological University, Dublin, and Clive Byrne, Director of the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals