Dublin District Court has made an enforcement order and awarded legal costs against a massage parlour where a worker was found to have suffered “egregious” sexual harassment, after hearing it was still trading but has failed to pay out on a record whistleblower penalisation award.
It follows an unprecedented move by the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) to give the worker an award at the maximum of its jurisdiction of five years’ pay for whistleblower penalisation last November, along with further sums for unfair dismissal and workplace rights breaches.
The massage parlour’s owner, who cannot be named, was not present when the case head was heard ex parte and in camera before Judge Marie Quirke at Dublin District Civil Court today.
Céile Varley BL, instructed by Wendy Lyon of Abbey Law Solicitors for the complainant, moved the application for enforcement of the WRC’s decision last November awarding €102,550 to the worker.
“That’s in recognition of the egregious penalisation which the applicant experienced,” Ms Varley said. She said there had been “very serious sexual harassment” against her client.
Counsel said the business owner had been served with notice of the motion in late January after missing the 56-day payment deadline on 30 December last year.
“Were the respondents represented in the WRC?” Judge Quirke asked.
“They didn’t attend,” Ms Varley said.
“No payment?” Judge Quirke asked.
“No payment,” Ms Varley said.
She submitted further that the respondents had been fully on notice of the claim before the WRC and the application for enforcement at the District Court.
An order for anonymity in the reporting of the proceedings extends to the identities of the worker, the business and its management.
Ms Varley confirmed to Judge Quirke that the massage parlour is still in existence.
“Still operating?” Judge Quirke asked.
“Yes. The business would be open today if you walked down [the street where it has its registered address],” Ms Varley said.
“I’ll make the order,” Judge Quirke said.
She also awarded court fees and legal costs in accordance with the District Court rules.
Ms Varley had already told the court that the WRC had heard the matter otherwise than in public and asked for the court to make an order for anonymity in the matter.
Judge Quirke had ordered the courtroom cleared, but permitted a member of the press to remain.
In his decision on the case last year, adjudicator Michael MacNamee recorded that the worker, who started at the parlour in 2019, told him in evidence that clients were asking for “additional services of a sexual nature”.
When the worker reported this to the couple running the massage parlour, they took her to dinner, told her she could do as the clients were asking – and then told her what prices she could charge, the worker told the WRC.
The managers told her she “could say no” – but they “could assure her that she wouldn’t get more clients” if she refused, the worker told the WRC.
The worker added that the male manager “routinely” made her give him free massages and would “push the boundaries” – pressuring her to “touch him intimately or provide him with sexual services”.
The worker said she refused his demands but that in response, the female manager became “rude, dismissive, and derogatory” towards her and rostered her for less work. Eventually, her bosses refused to pay her unless she saw at least four clients a day – leaving her unpaid on “multiple occasions”, she said.
When she returned from a holiday in early 2022, she discovered she was off the massage parlour’s roster and was told by her bosses she could “find another job”.
Mr MacNamee found there was a direct link between the worker’s refusal to provide sexual services and the acts of penalisation and said the male manager’s persisting demands for sexual services were “of even greater concern”.
He awarded €91,000 in a tax-free compensation lump sum for whistleblower penalisation in breach of the Protected Disclosures Act 2014.
Further awards for unfair dismissal and other employment rights breaches brought the total sum due to the worker on foot of her complaints to €102,550.