Kepak hired firm to ‘spy’ on employee

Meat giant Kepak hired a surveillance firm to "spy" at weekends on a worker who had logged a number of grievances against the firm.

Kepak’s deployment of a special surveillance firm to monitor the activities of night-time cleaning supervisor Noel Farrell is confirmed by the Employment Appeals Tribunal which found Mr Farrell was unfairly dismissed. The company has now been ordered to pay him €25,000.

Mr Farrell was sacked by Kepak from its meat processing plant at Ballymahon, Co Longford, in January 2013, and the tribunal has found the dismissal to be “unreasonable and disproportionate”.