THIRTY FORMER staff members of the Carrick Court Hotel in Co Monaghan are still owed tens of thousands of euro in unpaid wages following the closure of the hotel in April 2009, an employment appeals tribunal hearing heard yesterday.
Sheridan Hospitality Ltd, the company that owned the hotel, has been unable to pay the outstanding wages since it became insolvent.
The former workers, who range from chefs to chambermaids, have also been unable to access State compensation due to a 19-month delay in winding up the company.
Ten former staff – most from Latvia and Lithuania – appealed in person to the tribunal yesterday at a hearing in Monaghan to grant them access to State compensation. There were also separate claims made under the Payment of Wages Act.
One Latvian woman told the tribunal she was still owed €2,427 in unpaid salary by the hotel, which had paid her wages only sporadically while she worked there.
“I was paid some weeks and others not,” she said.
No member of the company was present for the hearing.
A representative of the Department of Social Protection told the tribunal the workers had not gained access to State compensation because the Employees (Employers’ Insolvency) Act 1984 only gives protection to workers in the case of insolvency for a maximum period of up 18 months following their dismissal.
But in this case Sheridan Hospitality was not put into liquidation until November 2010, which was 19 months after they had all lost their jobs, she said.
Tribunal chairman Peter O’Leary said the tribunal had no authority to go outside the time limits set down in legislation. He said it was very strange for a company to take 19 months to be placed in liquidation and said that a letter from the liquidator noted there had been a legal dispute during this period.
“There is so much we don’t know about this in relation to what happened. It may be unfair to make a decision today in relation to the whole thing,” he said. Mr O’Leary said the tribunal would reserve judgement on the case.
The Carrick Court Hotel closed down on April 7th, 2009, shortly after its main shareholder Eugene Sheridan was declared bankrupt by the High Court.
The hotel, formerly known as the Oasis Roadhouse, had received a multimillion euro revamp.