Employment Law in Ireland, by Neville Cox, Val Corbett and Desmond Ryan Clarus Press 892 pp, Hb, €185
FEW PEOPLE want to be involved in legal proceedings, and the lucky ones manage to avoid them for their whole lives.
However, various circumstances can bring people into interaction with the legal system, ranging from the entirely voluntary commission of a crime to the misfortune of being the victim of a crime in the area of criminal law, to a variety of disputes between individuals or organisations where a solution is sought in the civil law courts.
This can happen where a person is involved in an road traffic incident, or where a relationship with a spouse or partner breaks down. It can happen when neighbours have serious disagreements, or where an individual challenges the actions of a public body. It can also happen if a person is dismissed from their employment, or feels they have not been fairly treated by their employer.
In the latter case there are a number of avenues of redress. The individual may be a member of a trade union, and can call on it to deal with the problem.
He or she can go to the Employment Appeals Tribunal or, in a case of alleged discrimination on one of the nine grounds specified in the relevant legislation, to the Equality Tribunal.
The assistance of the Labour Court or the Health and Safety Authority can also be invoked. In most instances, decisions of these bodies can be appealed to the courts, and the courts can also be called upon in the first instance in certain circumstances.
This book, which runs to almost 900 pages, seeks to cover all areas regarding Irish employment law, describing its evolution, its interaction with constitutional law, and ECtHR jurisprudence and EU law. It also looks to future legislative developments.
For the individual employee, negotiating such a labyrinth can be daunting, if not downright impossible.
Should anyone embark on such a task, this book will be invaluable. However, it is more likely to turn up on the bookshelves of trade union officials and human relations managers, and of course on those of employment lawyers, than on those of individual disgruntled employees.
It begins by examining the nature of the employment relationship as defined in legislation and case-law, looking at both the contents of a typical contract and the position of atypical workers, including migrant workers.
It then looks at the workings of the employment relationship, the obligations of employers to consult on major developments, their health and safety obligations, and the duties of employees.
Equality legislation has been a major force in the evolution of employment law in Ireland, forcing employers to be much more analytical in their procedures for hiring and promoting employees, as well as ensuring that differentials in earnings are objectively justified. The authors give considerable attention to this area of law, including the prohibition of harassment and victimisation to which it has given rise.
A separate section is devoted to the breakdown in an employer-employee relationship, including the appropriate procedures whereby an employee may be disciplined or dismissed.
There is a chapter on industrial relations law, which does not concern the relationship between the individual employee and his or her employer, but the role of the courts and of the State’s industrial relations machinery in the arena of collective bargaining.
Most legal textbooks are of limited interest. However, as our economic difficulties continue to put jobs and working conditions under strain, the issue of fair procedures in dealings between employers and employees will be a live one for many.