Employee gets €40k after being propositioned by boss

An employee of a clothing and household retailer has been awarded €40,000 in compensation after telling the Workplace Relations Commission how her boss repeatedly sexually assaulted her.

The woman said she was first subjected to sexual harassment by the unnamed company director, Mr A, in May 2014 by which time she had been working for the company for two years.

The commission said the woman’s evidence was that the harassment took the form of unwelcome sexualised comments; repeated unwelcome sexualised propositioning; sexual assault in the form of smacking her bottom, feeling her breasts and poking her, squeezing her and gyrating against her bottom and otherwise manhandling her; sending unwelcome sexualised and offensive texts, including propositions and lewd pornographic imagery, most of which was outside of working hours.