Victimised pregnant employee wins €52k from newspaper group

A pregnant woman whose employer tried to make her redundant while she was on maternity leave and cut off her mobile phone and internet access while she was in labour has been awarded €52,000.

Independent Newspapers (Ireland) Ltd has been ordered to pay former employee Mary Murphy the equivalent of one year’s pay to compensate for distress caused by victimisation and discrimination.

Fanning and Kelly, solicitors for the company, said they intended to appeal the award.

Ms Murphy started worked with Independent Newspapers (Ireland) Ltd in Mar 2007 as a business development manager for its property portal. A year later, she told her manager she was pregnant.

In July, Ms Murphy sent her maternity form to HR for completion of the employer section.

When she collected it the next day, she was told her employment had transferred to Internet Interaction Ltd, the digital wing of Independent Newspapers (Ireland) Ltd. Ms Murphy went on maternity leave on Aug 11 and two days later was phoned and asked to attend a work meeting in Galway on Aug 14. The same day she was phoned by HR and told she had no entitlement to maternity pay because she was now working for Internet Interaction.

Ms Murphy was subsequently told she was being made redundant and that she had no entitlement to redundancy payments, but, as a gesture, she was offered four weeks’ pay plus holiday entitlements.

Ms Murphy subsequently advised her manager she would be taking a case to the Rights Commissioner. A couple of days later, Ms Murphy’s mobile phone and mobile internet connection were disconnected.

In its defence, Independent Newspapers said that, by Jul 2008, property transactions had plummeted so a cutback in business development/sales from seven to three staff was propounded.

Independent Newspapers said Ms Murphy was reinstated on the payroll in Feb 2009 on her original salary and was subsequently offered a new contract with Globrix.ie, formerly PropertyNews.ie. They apologised for phoning her on maternity leave and for giving the incorrect information in relation to maternity entitlements. Ms Murphy rejected her new contract and a redundancy offer and her employment was terminated in May 2009.

Equality officer Hugh Lonsdale ruled that Ms Murphy had been victimised and discriminated against in relation to conditions of employment and Independent Newspapers was ordered to compensate her to the tune of €52,000.