Alzheimer's charity ordered to pay compensation to care assistant it 'retired'

A west of Ireland charity has been ordered to pay a care assistant €14,000 compensation after discriminating against her by retiring her at age 65.

The Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) has ordered The West of Ireland Alzheimer Foundation to pay €14,000 to Kathleen Dempsey after it was found to have discriminated against her on the grounds of age under the Employment Equality Act when dismissing her.

WRC Adjudication Officer, Louise Boyle, found that the charity had discriminated against Ms Dempsey after finding that no legitimate health and safety grounds were presented that would have prevented Ms Dempsey working past the age of 65.

Ms Boyle stated that the charity was also unable to respond to why other employees were allowed to remain in employment, in recent times, after the age of 65 but Ms Dempsey was not permitted to do so.

Ms Boyle found Ms Dempsey’s evidence credible that when she raised objections to her retirement, her objections were ignored.

As part of her case, Ms Dempsey said that early in May 2018, her manager asked her would she be retiring later that month and Ms Dempsey replied that she would not.

She was then contacted by the HR Consultant for the charity and Ms Dempsey told the consultant that she would not be retiring.

Ms Dempsey said that it then came as a shock to receive a letter on May 11, 2018, detailing that her employment would cease on May 23, 2018, owing to retirement.

She stated that while a retirement age had been detailed in her contract of employment, at least three other employees had been allowed to stay on after the age of 65 in recent times.

In the case of one of the workers she had been allowed to stay on after the age of 70.

Ms Dempsey outlined that she had an unblemished record throughout her 15 years’ service with the charity and there had been no complaints regarding her ability to carry out her duties.

In response, the Alzheimer's charity denied that Ms Dempsey had been discriminated against on the basis of age.

The charity outlined that Ms Dempsey works a physically demanding role where she is required to take care of vulnerable patients including attending to their personal care such as washing, toileting and other aspects of daily living.

The charity stated that Ms Dempsey has had significant periods of absence in recent times which included three weeks in 2018, 10 weeks in 2017, 13 weeks in 2016 and 1.5 weeks in 2015 and, while it was not in question that the absences were genuine and certified, it was an indicator of a trend that those in labour-intensive work will suffer with increasing illnesses as they get older.

The charity said that Ms Dempsey’s employment had not been terminated because of her health issues but because of a retirement age.

The charity confirmed that no other employees who stayed on after the age of 65 had to formally request to stay on.