The Labour Court overturns the WRC decision and held that a GP discriminated against an employee arising from her pregnancy and awarded the employee €27,500. There was no job available for the employee when she returned to work and therefore she deemed herself to have been dismissed. The Labour Court stated that the GP employer failed to discharge the burden to prove that the dismissal was unconnected with the employee’s pregnancy. The Labour Court did not have any regard to the fact that the employee did not give the advance notice of her return to work date. Therefore, employers should be pro-active in respect of employees on protected leave and not rely on receiving the return to work notification. http://www.workplacerelations.ie/en/Cases/2018/April/EDA1825.html
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