A solicitor who has accused her former firm of letting her go because she was about to take maternity leave has admitted she was dancing at a wedding days before she wrote she had “anxiety” about going into the office.
Orla Howe said the Covid-19 safety guidelines were being observed at the 50-person wedding in August 2021 – but that the offices of Co Kerry law firm Healy Crowley Ahern had little ventilation, with windows that were painted shut and no screening.
In a complaint under the Employment Equality Act 1998, she has accused the firm’s principal solicitor, Colm Kelly, of sacking her in a “sham” redundancy amounting to an act of discrimination on the grounds of gender.
The claim is denied by the firm, which maintains Ms Howe’s redundancy was a “genuine redundancy” on the grounds that the conveyancing work she was hired for had dropped off and that the firm was facing financial challenges, including a drop in profits from €150,000 to €30,000 as a result of the pandemic.
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Ms Howe told the tribunal Mr Kelly stopped new files going to her and excluded her from meetings before putting her on notice of redundancy, she said, claims denied by the respondent but cited as evidence pointing to a pre-determined decision to dismiss her by her solicitor.
Ms Howe told the Workplace Relations Commission yesterday that she had not been “compelled” at any stage to work from the office during her pregnancy, but that Mr Kelly said she would “need to come in to keep things moving”.
“My anxiety is heightened, particularly in circumstances where I have a high-risk pregnancy,” she told her employer in an email on August 17th 2021, submitted in evidence.
The email was raised in cross-examination by the respondent’s employment lawyer, David Gaffney, who asked: “You were uncertain about going to the office [but] did you attend a wedding on 20 August?”
Ms Howe said at first she knew she had been invited to two weddings that year and only attended one, but after consulting with her partner, who accompanied her at the hearing, she said she had been at a wedding on that date.
“How many were at the wedding?” Mr Gaffney asked.
“I’m not certain, I think in the region of 50,” she replied.
“Where was it?” counsel asked.
“In Galway,” she said.
“Was it a church wedding? Did you go to church?”
“Yes,” Ms Howe said.
“You had no concerns about attending a wedding on 20 August [but] you had concerns about going to the office,” Mr Gaffney said.
“All the Covid guidelines would have been observed,” she replied.
“A wedding was safer than Mr Kelly’s office, working with a couple of people?”
“I’m not saying either. I went to the wedding, I wasn’t mixing and mingling,” Ms Howe said.
“Did you dance that night?” Mr Gaffney asked.
“There was dancing, yes,” she replied.
Adjudicating officer Marie Flynn then asked the complainant directly: “Did you dance?”
“Yes,” Ms Howe said.
Mr Gaffney put it to her that the office environment would have been safer than a wedding and that it would “look odd” to write to her employer two days later raising concerns about pandemic safety.
“I have no comment on it, Mr Gaffney,” the complainant replied.
A former colleague of Ms Howe’s, Claire Marmion, said she had a conversation with Mr Kelly on the news of Ms Howe’s pregnancy around this time.
Ms Marmion said Mr Kelly remarked: “I didn’t see that coming,” before asking her if she intended to have more children herself.
Ms Howe’s solicitor, David Pearson, said that it was only after Ms Howe made her pregnancy known to Mr Kelly, that that the respondent spoke with his accountants, before then placing her on notice of a redundancy risk in September and giving notice of termination on 19th November that year.
That, he said, was “a very short period to consider all alternatives”.
“The consultancy process, I say, was a sham. The decision was made by Mr Kelly when he heard of the pregnancy and, quote, ‘didn’t see that coming’,” Mr Pearson said.
Adjudicating officer Marie Flynn is considering her decision, which will be issued in writing to the parties before being made public in due course.