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THE IRISH ARM of international logistics giant, DHL has been ordered to pay €72,042 to an accident-prone van driver in an unfair dismissal action.
This follows the Labour Court awarding Michael Coughlan two years pay when finding that he was unfairly dismissed by DHL Express Ireland Ltd after his company van collided with fencing at a DHL depot in Cork causing €2,500 worth of damage.
The accident in October 2015 followed Coughlan going on a refresher training course after he was involved in accidents in DHL vans in 2012 and 2013.
In its ruling, the Labour Court ruled that the summary dismissal imposed on Coughlan by DHL “was disproportionate and unwarranted in all the circumstances”.
The court also found that DHL did not give due consideration to imposing an alternative and more proportionate sanction on Coughlan or give him the option of contributing to the cost of the repairs to the company van necessitated by his error of judgement.
The court also found that DHL gave undue weight to Coughlan’s previous accidents while driving DHL vans.
Unfair dismissal
Coughlan received two separate 12 month written warnings for the accidents in 2012 and 2013 and the court found that the decision to dismiss him was informed to no small extent by those previous incidents, pointing that the warnings clearly provided for their expungement after the 12 month period.
The case was before the Labour Court after DHL Ireland appealed a ruling by a Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) Adjudication Officer which found that Coughlan was unfairly dismissed and ordered his reinstatement.
As a result of the October 2015 crash, DHL sacked Coughlan for gross misconduct in November 2015 and in the dismissal letter told him:
“The company has serious concerns about your ability to safely carry out your duties as a driver and can’t trust that you won’t have a similar lapse in judgment which may result in further damage or potential injury to yourself or others.”
DHL told Coughlan:
The company cannot accept this level of negligence and poor judgment from a driver who takes a van on public roads on a daily basis.
It is the company’s opinion that you were driving carelessly and your poor judgment caused over €2,500 of damage to the driver’s side of the van when you collided with the fencing.
They stated that “this is an extremely serious issue in light of your history with causing damage to both the company van and customer property”.
The company added that it had previously provided Coughlan with substantial training and had gone to extensive efforts to ensure he was driving in a safe manner.
‘Error in judgement’
Coughlan appealed the decision internally pointing out that the October 2015 accident “was just an error of judgement”.
However, upholding the decision to sack him, Head of Operations, Michael O’Farrell told Coughlan:
I do not accept that we cannot and should not consider the other serious incidents that you have been involved in over recent years. As a responsible organisation we have made every effort to assist you through retraining in an effort to address any driving skills; however, we now need to recognise the duty of care we have to the public, other staff and to you, yourself.
Following the 2013 accident, Coughlan was offered a choice of redundancy; redeployment to a job in the warehouse; or a driver’s retraining programme and he chose the training programme.
However, DHL stated that with the October 2015 accident, the company had lost trust in the driver.
Represented by Siptu in the case, Coughlan said that since his dismissal, he had applied for 23 or 24 jobs without success and these included courier, driver, general operative, cleaner and store person.
The former driver told the court that he commenced work on a Community Employment scheme in May of this year and receives an additional €22 on top of his Department of Social Protection payment.
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We can’t police our streets as it is at the moment. How on earth are they going to police public transport? We need an American style type of policing, three strikes and you’re done. We also need our judiciary system to up their game and hand down harder penalties and to stick to them. That way our streets and transport will be more safer.
@Brian k.: the jails are full and they haven’t opened a new one since 1989. No point in increasing police numbers until that is sorted.
@Brian k.: We absolutely do NOT need the American model of anything, especially policing. It’s been shown time and time and time again to be biased and ineffective. All it does is increase the numbers of disadvantaged people in the prison-industrial complex, which is exactly what it’s supposed to do. Updated slavery by another name. We’re better than that
@Brian k.: three strikes is proven not to be a deterrent and is proven to increase violence among offenders. It doesn’t work.
@Paul C: We have to start somewhere. Currently we have repeat offenders with 100+ convictions and no sign of them reforming.
@John Fahy: The midlands prison opened in 2000. I agree with your point that more prison space is urgently needed.
@John Fahy: start executing some of the serial offenders with 500 previous convictions would soon clear out the prisons. No loss to society.
@Brian k.: What’s your goal, to punish those who commit crime or reduce crime overall? If it’s the latter, the US model has shown harsher sentences and prison conditions don’t achieve this
@Brian k.: American style policing, what just shoot everybody who you perceive as a threat. Believe you me American style policing is the last thing we need in this country.
@Brian k.: imagine a public transport police somewhere in another Eu country. Crazy how Ireland is being crazily mismanaged by the government and how baffling how there is absolutely 0 accountability for it.
@Brian k.: are you going to pay the massive tax hike to facilitate the building of more prisons, courts, and hiring of more staff at every level of the justice system to facilitate this? America is more dangerous than it’s ever been and mass incarceration is not a deterrent.
@John Fahy: exactly, and worse part is that over 20million Euro was spent buying a site for a prison and it’s costing thousands more to secure it now and not a block or foundation dug..
@John Fahy: That’s correct. We need a lot more prisons to be built.
@Dave G Doe: very good point!
@John Fahy: Helen mcentee was looking at potential a few years ago. Nothing happened, no surprise there then.
@Paul C: Woke people believe that if they say something, then it is so!
Only one way for the Government to take back control of our streets and that is to hit offenders where it hurts.
Take away their freedom and hit them in the pocket by making deductions from bank accounts or social welfare payments to ensure that fines are paid.
Start by sacking every judges in the country. Most of them haven’t a clue. Giving out suspended sentences for paedophiles like it’s no bother at all
@reg morrisey:
Judge Nolan should be up the first one there.
If they were serious about tackling crime and marking those responsible accountable then hit offenders in the pocket. Increase court fines and take it from their dole (yes most offenders do not work!) and not in lots of small instalments. If they’re fined €500, take €50 a week for 10 weeks. If teenage thugs under 18 are convicted, take it from their parents children’s allowance. Nothing else works, there are no prison places and community service etc doesn’t work. Mandatory fines taken from your pay for dole will make many of them think twice before committing crimes.
Once they keep the Luas Green for members of better stock and no North or West Side Skangers on it.
Eight thousand soldiers sitting on their holes, why not use them, the French do
Like everything in Ireland I don’t think any of the 4 .5 % reduction will be seen by the consumer…
Ah I see the usual sock puppets are heavily active on this thread cheering each other on with their usual hang’em high cow feces
How about we focus on actually sentencing people properly first? There’s no point hiring “transport police” when we can’t even police the main streets in the city centre. Even if we did hire these “transport release”, unless we fix our sentencing laws it’s still just going to be more catch and release for the criminals. There is no reason why the Dáil can’t pass a bill which mandates that the government has to build at least 5 new prisons in the next 10 years on state-owned land. We also need to introduce mandatory minimums for all crimes and make sure that a life sentence means exactly that – a life sentence. You’re not released after 18 years and no chance of getting early parole. We also need a three-strikes rule with a minimum 25 year sentence for those who break it.
Lol! So a new ‘Dublin’ police force then?
The NTA and TFI are not fit for purpose, bring back the carriage office and let them police all public transport services including taxis, the amount of illegal/undocumented taxis on the road is unbelievable
Gardai can’t cope with current level of antisocial behaviour. Judicial system is broken with repeat offenders having no incentive to desist.
Now a new type of garda with different level of authority and can only operate in certain environments and likely will have to hand over detainee to a garda anyway. Recipie for inefficiency.
Will believe it when l see it
If men were just men again it be grand. Telling ye, a few pud mouths wrecking my head and illnjust drag them off at the next stop. I was born in the 90s but I know this was how it was done in the 70s
would they fine their recurrent traffic offenders and report those rude drivers who deliberately miss their bus stops ?
…
Can’t recruit gardai naval personal army airport and now they want transport police lol
have your say