A civilian garda driver, Mr Tom Ronan, is seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court after having been refused an interlocutory injunction by the High Court. Mr Ronan was recently successful in a complaint before the Workplace Relations Commission (“WRC”) in which he claimed that he was discriminated against on the ground of age when he was forced to retire at 70. That decision is under appeal to the Labour Court.
Decision of the Workplace Relations Commission
In our newsletter article “WRC Orders Re-Engagement of Driver Forced to Retire at 70 – Mandatory Retirement ‘Highly Likely’ to Cause Him Financial Hardship” here, we examined the WRC decision in Tom Ronan v An Garda Síochána (ADJ-00047174). In that decision the Adjudicator, Brian Dalton, found that the Complainant who was forced to retire at 70 was discriminated against on the ground of age. He ordered that the Complainant be re-engaged in his role as a driver with the Respondent organisation within a period of four weeks from the date of the decision, and that his employment be extended by a further three years from the date of re-engagement. What was particularly interesting in that decision, was the fact that the retirement age was objectively justified, but the Adjudicator nevertheless found that the mandatory retirement age was unreasonable for the Complainant due to the financial hardship that he would endure.
The Respondent appealed the WRC decision to the Labour Court, which will involve a de novo hearing.
Interim Injunction
Mr Ronan was successful in his application to the High Court for an interim injunction requiring the Garda Commissioner to immediately re-engage him as a civilian driver with An Garda Síochána and he returned to work performing his duties on a “for time being” basis.
Interlocutory Injunction
However, Mr Ronan’s application for an interlocutory injunction was recently refused by the High Court. On 14th February 2025, Mr Justice Rory Mulcahy refused to continue the interim order. In Tom Ronan v. Commissioner for An Garda Siochana, Ireland and the Attorney General [2025] IEHC 79 Mr Justice Mulcahy found that:
“there seems little doubt that the plaintiff cannot pursue a claim in this court that he has been discriminated against on the grounds of age, there being a statutory remedy available, a statutory remedy, moreover, which he has been pursuing since 2023.”
He found that the appropriate manner to pursue the Plaintiff’s claim for discrimination on the grounds of age was through the statutory mechanism of the WRC and the Labour Court. He found that it would not be appropriate for him to “trespass” on the decision-making role of the Labour Court to which the WRC decision has been appealed. Mr Justice Mulcahy found that the Plaintiff appeared not to be entitled to a remedy for discrimination on the grounds of age from the High Court “at all”.
Mr Justice Mulcahy further decided that the granting of an injunction in this case would, as in the case of Power v HSE [2019] IEHC 462, involve the court deciding matters on an interlocutory basis in circumstances where it “would not and could not decide the substance of the case.” He also found that the statutory scheme for dealing with age discrimination cases does not require WRC decisions to be implemented where they are appealed to the Labour Court and are awaiting a de novo hearing in the Labour Court. He referred to section 43(3) of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 which makes it clear that where a WRC decision is appealed to the Labour Court, the WRC order cannot be enforced by the District Court.
“That being so, it is clearly not correct to suggest that an order from the WRC which is under appeal should be treated as being operative. To grant an injunction to give effect to the terms of the WRC order would, therefore, not supplement but subvert the statutory scheme.”
He decided that even if there was an exceptional jurisdiction to grant relief where there is a statutory remedy, that jurisdiction would be limited to exceptional circumstances where the statutory remedy was “wholly undermined”. In this case, he was satisfied that there were no such exceptional circumstances, and the statutory scheme had not been wholly undermined.
Mr Ronan is now seeking leave to appeal the High Court refusal to the Supreme Court or in the alternative to the Court of Appeal.
Takeaway for Employers: The area of mandatory retirement ages and age discrimination is a complex one. It will be very interesting to see what the Labour Court decides in respect of the appeal of the WRC decision in this case. It is advisable for employers to obtain legal advice before terminating an employee’s employment on the basis of a mandatory retirement age, and in considering a request(s) from an employee to work beyond the mandatory retirement age.
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Author – Jenny Wakely
3rd March 2025
Anne O’Connell
Solicitors
19-22 Lower Baggot Street
Dublin 2.
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