The husband of former Fine Gael TD Kate O’Connell has denied swearing at an employee who accused his wife of bullying before he quit his job at one of their pharmacies two years ago.
The Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) concluded its hearings on Tuesday into complaints against Rathgar Pharmacy Ltd by Marwan Al Rahbi under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 and the Employment Equality Act 1998.
Al Rahbi, an Omani national, resigned in the summer of 2024 from his €112,000-a-year job as a pharmacist at the O’Connells’ company, which operates three pharmacies in south Dublin.
He has since returned to the Gulf with his family for work, the tribunal was told.
READ MORE
A central element of the worker’s case is his claim that Kate O’Connell bullied him at work – and that as he could not realistically address that by approaching her husband to make a workplace grievance, he had no option other than to quit.
The WRC has heard that Al Rahbi complained about Kate O’Connell to her husband after she pulled the complainant up on using his mobile phone at work in April 2024.
Al Rahbi’s evidence was that he was on his phone that day because he was dealing with a sick child. Kate O’Connell, he said, was “very rude” to him on that occasion.
“I am a pharmacist, a respected professional, how should I react?” he said. His case was that he told Kate O’Connell she should speak to him “professionally”.
The employer’s stance was that it had a strict no-phones policy – while Al Rahbi said in evidence that pharmacists were permitted to use their personal devices and that all staff used them at work.
The company’s position was that Al Rahbi had been “so distracted” on his phone he did not notice Kate O’Connell arrive.
Kate O’Connell told the tribunal last year that Al Rahbi was “insubordinate” towards her on April 15th, 2024. “It was the flying off the handle at me ... it was extremely unusual for a support pharmacist to verbally attack their senior pharmacist, their boss, in front of other staff,” she said.
The complainant said he then phoned Morgan O’Connell about what had happened – without realising the latter was just out of surgery in hospital after suffering a fractured collarbone, broken rib and punctured lung in a tag rugby match.
Morgan O’Connell said Al Rahbi phoned him “shouting about Kate” and he was told by a nurse to hang up the phone.
Al Rahbi’s evidence was that on one occasion that spring, he was told to “go the f*ck back to work” by Morgan O’Connell while he was in hospital.
Morgan O’Connell denied using the f-word towards Al Rahbi. He said Al-Rahbi had phoned him again later when he was recuperating from his surgery in Kerry.
Al Rahbi was “quite hyped up on the phone and aggressive”.
He said after discussing the matter, Al Rahbi asked him what to do and he said to him: “Go back to work.”
“I don’t curse at staff,” Morgan O’Connell said.
He said the business’s policy was that staff were not allowed used their personal devices unless “pre-cleared” to do so by himself or Kate O’Connell.
Morgan O’Connell said under cross-examination that he had warned Al Rahbi about “repeated phone use in the pharmacy”.
Morgan O’Connell said that in a subsequent interaction with Al Rahbi, the complainant had “agreed that I would give him instruction” but “wouldn’t accept instruction” from other senior staff at the pharmacy group, including his wife.
“I was saying: ‘Why can’t you say Kate is your boss?’,” he said.
The complainant said Morgan O’Connell was “shaking” and “screaming” at him, quoting him as saying: “Say Kate is your boss”.
The employer’s position was that Al Rahbi replied: “No I will not say she is my boss,” and then “went to the yard in a rage”, the firm’s barrister, Derek Dunne BL, submitted last year.
“Each action has an opposite reaction,” Al Rahbi said when this was put to him in cross-examination earlier in the hearings.
Al Rahbi met with the O’Connells in May 2024 off the premises, the tribunal heard.
Morgan O’Connell’s evidence was that the grievance Mr Al Rahbi initiated against his wife was “immediately withdrawn” by the complainant at that meeting.
Kate O’Connell’s evidence was that Al Rahbi gave notice of resignation on that occasion, whileMr Al Rahbi said Morgan O’Connell told him he was “dismissed”.
Al Rahbi’s evidence was that Morgan O’Connell told him: ‘You are here just to listen, not to speak.’
He said he reached “breaking point” the following month and resigned then.
In a closing submission, Cillian McGovern BL, for the complainant, said it had been “well established” that the O’Connells did not have a clear workplace grievance process in place.
“It’s clear from the evidence no one knows how a matter gets resolved, should the matter concern the owners,” he said. This was “manifestly unsound”, he added.
Al Rahbi’s mental health had been “destroyed” over the course of a number of years working under the O’Connells to the point he had to quit “to preserve himself and his young family”, McGovern said.
Dunne, for the respondent, argued the tribunal was being asked to conclude that an employment relationship which had lasted two years broke down completely in the space of two months.
Various allegations raised by Al Rahbi alleging bullying, shouting, religious discrimination, pressure to sign documents and issues about working hours had “ascended to no more than assertion” during the hearings, he said.
He said the only potential grievance Al Rahbi could point to was “perhaps the allegation of bullying, which was never substantiated, withdrawn immediately, and never pursued further”, counsel said.
Adjudicator Andrew Heavey then concluded the hearing.
McGovern was instructed by Crushell & Co Solicitors in the matter. Dunne appeared with Kelly Hoban Solicitors. The adjudication in the case will be given at a later date.
