Firm to challenge court wage ruling

A SOFT drink processing and packaging firm claims it should be excluded from a statutory wage agreement because a pure fruit juice it produces is not fizzy, the High Court has heard.

P Mulrine and Son (Sales), Donegal Road, Ballybofey, Co Donegal, was yesterday given permission to challenge a Labour Court decision that 46 of its employees are covered by an Employment Regulation Order (ERO), a mechanism that allows for the statutory setting of wage levels for those in aerated waters and wholesale bottling sectors.

It is claimed the Labour Court erred in finding Mulrine’s pure fruit juice product brought the company under the terms of the ERO because it had not taken into account that such drinks had to contain sugar and/or be aerated.

Mr Justice Michael Peart granted the company leave, on a one-side only basis, to seek to quash the decision by way of judicial review.

SIPTU, representing the workers, is a notice party and the case will come back to the court next month.

Tom Mallon, counsel for Mulrine, said the application arose out of a Labour Court decision of April last in which it found in favour of SIPTU that the production of fruit juices constitute the manufacture of unfermented sweet drinks and is therefore a branch of the trade encompassed by the ERO.

The Labour Court erred because what was required was that unfermented sweet drinks have to contain sugar and/or be aerated, not just contain sugar, he said.

Mr Mallon said the court was also wrong in finding 46 employees were covered by the ERO when 12 no longer work there. It also failed to have regard to the fact that most of the 46 had no involvement in the bottling of soft drinks.

Mulrine had got out of bottling soft drinks 10 years ago and its business now was mainly that of juice and sauce manufacturer and its packaging, he said. Only a small part of the business involves mineral waters.

While the company pays above the rate required under the ERO, counsel said, it had concerns as to how it affected the defined benefit pension scheme it operates. It was concerned about the effect of a law which compels it to go into something it does not want to go into.