English pipe-fitter awarded €20,000 for abuse
Tuesday August 12 2008
AN English pipe-fitter who was taunted, sniggered at and persistently teased about his nationality by work colleagues, has been awarded €20,000 after an Employment Tribunal found he was racially abused.
The man, identified only as Mr C, worked for an engineering company on a Dublin building site where, he claimed, the other members of the crew would gather around him, jump like a football crowd, and sing anti-British Irish rebel songs, of which he remembered one: "Some say the Devil is dead and buried in Killarney/More say he rose again and joined the British Army."
Some workers never spoke to him and whenever staff had to enter dangerous spaces, they would say "send the Brit in".
Negative reports about England, such as a story about a nuclear plant in Sellafield, or the performance of the English football team during the World Cup in Germany, were also read out aloud in his presence.
The man, who requested anonymity, told an Equality Tribunal that shortly after joining the firm April 2006, the abuse was so bad, he began eating lunch in his car instead of the canteen as he felt the banter was directed towards him.
He also described his supervisor, Mr B, as "intimidating", and said he sometimes joined in the sniggering and laughing and did nothing to stop it.
Mr C said he did not complain about the situation to his union because he felt he needed his wages, about €1,450 per week, to provide for his family. The complainant stated that he was afraid he would lose his job if he raised a complaint.
Just two months after he started work with the company, Mr C was made redundant. He said he was sacked instead of a less-experienced Irish worker because he was British.
When the issue of redundancy arose, he said one worker remarked: "the Brit should be sacked and an Irishman should not be let go", while another said to the supervisor: "No Irishman is going out of the gate while we employ a Brit."
Allegations
The company rejected the harassment allegations and claimed the man never complained to his site manager about the abuse. It also said the man was laid off because he had less service than other workers on the site.
Mr B, the supervisor, told the tribunal he had put the treatment of the complainant down to "banter", but now conceded that the complainant "took it to be something else".
The board of the Equality Tribunal found the man was racially harassed and that some of the acts were of "a blatant and intimidatory nature".
- Grainne Cunningham
