All Whistleblowers who exposed corruption in An Garda Siochana have been destroyed, framed, sacked and even jailed
All Whistleblowers who exposed corruption in An Garda Siochana have been destroyed
One whistleblower jailed for exposing corruption in the DPP's office and Gardai
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An accountant who was sacked after raising concerns about the level of expenses at the Garda health insurance society - having shut down a bar tab at its Christmas party - has won €85,000 for unfair dismissal.
Michael Dodd, the former general manager of the St Paul's Garda Medical Aid Society, won the sum in a claim under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 after he was dismissed by its board without notice or any reason being given in September 2023.
Part of Mr Dodd's case was that his dismissal was linked to whistleblowing.
The organisation provides health insurance and occupational injury cover on a non-profit basis to gardaí and their families.
Mr Dodd took a post as the society's general manager in September 2022 after more than two decades working as an accountant for An Garda Siochána.
The organisation wanted to improve its governance, having "traditionally" been run by members of the force on secondment, he said.
That December, when it held its Christmas party, Mr Dodd said he discovered that "a tab had been opened in the hotel bar where many of the attendees were staying".
He did not consider this appropriate, and closed the tab, he told the tribunal.
The following month, January 2023, he objected to an open bar at a retirement party, but was overruled when the Society's committee "voted to approve it anyway".
After passing his probation that spring, Mr Dodd said he started "raising concerns about the level of expenses"being paid out by the society in connection with its various committee meetings.
The number of meetings was going up and so was the cost of the expenses, and he was concerned that committee members were being paid "lat rate and unvouched" he told the tribunal.
He started pushing to cut the number of meetings generally, and to meet at the society' head office in Dublin to reduce the expenses paid to committee members from the capital, he said.
In August that year, he told the tribunal, he tried to tell the society' committee that it had a legal obligation to do a revaluation of its assets. The society faced a bill of €30,000 to have an independent evaluator come in and do this, he said.
Committee members insisted the society enjoyed an exemption from the requirement to periodically review its assets and it became "an issue" at a meeting that month. Mr Dodd then set out his position in writing that there was no exemption, he said.
He was called to a meeting with the chairman and a committee member at the Castleknock Hotel in Dublin, during which he was told he was being dismissed. Mr Dodd had a three-month contractual notice period, but no notice was provided for, the tribunal heard.
Mr Dodd said he "asked for a reason but wasn’t given one". He gave back his work laptop, and left, he said.
The society denied that Mr Dodd made any protected disclosure.
In his decision on the case, adjudicator David James Murphy wrote that the society "failed to adhere to any sort of fair procedure" in terminating Mr Dodd’s employment.
He ruled the society had caused its former manager "serious financial loss" by dismissing him "in contravention" of the Unfair Dismissals Act and awarded him €85,000.
Frank Drumm BL appeared for the complainant instructed by Collier Law; Elizabeth Murphy BL was instructed by O’Donoghue Solicitors for the respondent.
The society's lawyers had initially argued that since Mr Dodd had less than a year's service, he was not shielded by the Unfair Dismissals Act.
Mr Dodd's legal team took the position that since their client was not paid notice, his service for the purposes of the act had persisted longer than a year.
They also advanced a second complaint under the same legislation alleging that the dismissal was "wholly or mainly from [their client] having made a protected disclosure".
Mr Murphy sided with the complainant and accepted Mr Dodd had sufficient service to pursue a complaint under the Unfair Dismissals Act without recourse to the whistleblower protection provisions, which would waive the normal service requirements.
The chairperson of the gardaí’s medical insurance society stepped down last year because of concerns over how the society was being governed, the has learned.
https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40984286.html
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