A client services manager with Zomax Limited, a CD manufacturer and distributor, has lost his High Court application for an order requiring the company to continue paying his salary pending the outcome of legal proceedings challenging a decision to make him redundant.
Mr Robert Orr (49), Claremont Road, Howth, Dublin, who was earning €63,980 a year with Zomax, of Cloverhill Industrial Estate, Clondalkin, Dublin, had alleged his redundancy was contrived. He had been employed by KAO Informatiom Systems from 1995. After a transfer of undertaking by KAO to Zomax in 1999, Mr Orr continued in employment with Zomax until this year.
In November 2003, Zomax announced a reorganisation under which a new business relationship manager position was to be created amalgamating Mr Orr's role as client services manager and the position of contract centre manager.
Mr Orr applied for the job but was told on November 18th, 2003 he was unsuccessful and was later given notice of redundancy. The company said Mr Orr's contract had been terminated in accordance with the terms of that contract.
In a reserved judgment yesterday, Ms Justice Carroll held that Mr Orr had not established a fair issue to be tried on grounds alleging he was unfairly dismissed because there was no valid redundancy and that he was really dismissed because of criticisms made about him.
What Mr Orr was seeking to do in the proceedings was to introduce a new obligation under the common law on an employer to act resonably and fairly in the case of dismissal, the judge said.
As the law stood, at common law an employer could terminate employment for any reason or no reason provided adequate notice was given, she said.
The most appropriate course was to have an early trial and the case could be given priority in the list to fix dates at the end of the next court term, she held.