Roblev I am referring to Irish employment law, as a small businessman with 12 employees I speak from experience in these cases.
In the case of a sacking, best practice over here is to pay notice.
Trying to sack a malingerer who is there over 12mths is a long drawn out process, you must retrain,retrain ,warn,warn sack this can take up to 18mths.
Employment appeals tribunals over here take the view that employers are wrong unless proven otherwise.
In Ireland over the 26 weeks maternity leave they build up 2 weeks holidays. Having children is a lifestyle choice in most cases, why should I pay someone holiday pay when they are not working ? why should I pay for it ? if someone takes a day off to get a big tattoo should I pay for them to be off ?
As a self employed person my wife got no paid leave, no maternity pay at all and no paid days off for scans etc
Why should someones choice to have a child be subsidised by their employer ? Yes they are still on the books but they are not working!
We can employ maternity cover over here too, my point was they dont have to tell you they are not coming back until they are due to come back , thus leaving you in the lurch again, politely inquiring as to their intentions can be seen as harassment.Im not talking about heavy lifting or clearly unsafe practises, im talking about simply taking the piss and pulling the pregnancy card because it suits them.
In the sacking case you would guess wrong ! Truck driver was seen filling his truck and his wifes car at then filling station and charging it to the companies card. Admitted it when questioned and begged for forgiveness, offered to pay back, had been going on for a while when they checked the figures. Owner sacked him on the spot.
At the EAT drivers english suddenly was so poor that he needed a translator, said he didnt realise what was happening at the time, court held there was clear breach of procedure and nailed employer.
As I said earlier EAT starts with the position that the employer is wrong and then opens the case.
Roblev Im at this game for 25 years, most of my staff are with me for years so I must be treating them ok, the idea behind accommodating pregnant workers isnt a bad one, the problem arises when small businesses who are just surviving are hit with extra costs for something that is out of their control and is effectively a lifestyle choice of their employee. When you are finding it hard to pay the bills having to fork out €2k to someone whos sitting at home is a hard one to take.
Put it this way, if your co worker got pregnant, would it be fair if money was deducted from your wages to pay her holiday pay while shes off, she is your co worker after all.
The EAT over here has produced some horror stories over the years, they love their practices and procedures, yes there are plenty od shitty employers who screw over people and ive no problem with them been nailed. Id just like to like to see a two way far system.
