DUBLIN: The High Court has ruled against a Labour Court ruling in a case of unjust dismissal of a staff member at the Kuwaiti embassy in Dublin. The High Court ruled in favor of the embassy, overturning a Labour Court decision that concluded the employee was entitled to pursue an unfair dismissal claim.
The High Court said the Labour Court adopted an incorrect approach in deciding whether the embassy was entitled to sovereign immunity. It referred the case to the Labour Court, directing that further decision be taken “in accordance with the law”.
High Court Judge Justice Anthony Barr said that the Labour Court was obliged to state the evidence considered by the appeal and the reasons for its rejection. “In reaching either of those conclusions, it had to set out clearly the reasons why it had reached whichever conclusion it chose,” Mr. Barr said. “Unfortunately, that did not happen in this case,” he added.
The High Court ruled that the embassy’s appeal should be granted since the Labour Court failed to provide sufficient reasons for their decision.
The Labour Court ruled in 2019 that Nada Kanj, who has both Irish and Lebanese citizenship, was not barred from benefiting of Ireland’s employment protection laws.
The case is as follows:
Nada Kanj worked as an academic adviser at the embassy until 2017. She lodged an unfair dismissal claim with the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC). But the WRC said that they had no jurisdiction to hear the case because the embassy was a sovereign institution.
Following the WRC statement, Ms Kanj filed an appeal in the Labour Court against this decision. The Labour Court ruled that she was entitled to pursue her claim under UN rules and that sovereign immunity could not be invoked. The embassy went to the high court against this ruling.
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