A WOMAN who told her employers she intended taking a sex discrimination case against them (suffered further discrimination as a result of her disclosure, the Labour Relations Commission (LRC) has found.
The LRC recommended that the Dublin based company, PWA International, pays £2,500 to the claimant, Ms Audrey Kirwan, for the "upset and anxiety" caused to her.
The company, which is a joint venture between the US jet engine manufacturer Pratt and Whitney and Airmotive Ireland, repairs jet engine cases in its facility near Rathcoole, Co Dublin.
The commission upheld Ms Kirwan's claim that she was effectively demoted in the company's organisational chart, not informed about meetings, excluded, from information and undermined in relation to a computer, project committee, after she served notice of her intention to lodge a sex discrimination claim.
Ms Kirwan's original claim arose out of an offer of promotion from her post of assistant manager of financial operations to a management position in 1993. She alleged she was treated differently to three men promoted to management posts at the same time, as she was not offered a salary increase. Ms Kirwan turned down the promotion as offered and sought parity of treatment with the other managers.
The company claimed that, as Ms Kirwan did not accept the terms and conditions attaching to the promotion offer, she denied the position to herself.
The LRC's equality officer ruled in Ms Kirwan's favour last April. The ruling was released yesterday.
The chief executive of the Employment Equality Agency, Ms Carmel Foley, said the case "indicates how policies and practices can fall short of the legal rights on equality and indicates how the legal route can redress this. Many employers clearly need to review their personnel procedures."