The Mandate trade union's press officer has launched a legal claim against his employer, accusing them of penalisation and unlawful pay deductions.
David Gibney has raised complaints alleging penalisation in breach of the Protected Disclosures Act 2014 and the Employees (Provision of Information and Consultation) Act 2014 against the trade union.
He has also brought a claim accusing Mandate of breaching the Payment of Wages Act 1994.
The union maintains he has no legal standing to make the complaints.
No further details on the exact issues in dispute were opened before the Workplace Relations Commission at a brief preliminary hearing today, which dealt chiefly with case management matters.
Counsel for the trade union, Tiernan Lowey BL, appearing instructed by Colette Cleary of CC Solicitors, said the parties were in agreement that the tribunal could address the union's preliminary objections to Mr Gibney's complaints without an oral hearing on the legal points.
Mandate's position is that the tribunal has no jurisdiction to hear the complaints, arguing Mr Gibney had missed the statutory deadlines in each of the matters and lacked legal standing to bring the Employees Act penalisation claim.
The legislation protects employees in performing the function of an appointed or elected staff representative.
"We believe all matters are capable of being dealt with in written submissions on that basis. It’s probably obvious on one level - we say the claims are already demonstrably out of time and that they are part of an internal process, or that they are in fact, not stateable," Mr Lowey said.
"There is, as you know, an internal process underway, and the parties have agreed that matter will be suspended pending the full determination of the statutory claims," Mr Lowey added.
"So any internal investigation will stop?" asked adjudicator Jim Dolan.
"Yes, so there's no risk one process will prejudice another," Mr Lowey said.
The complainant’s solicitor, Andrew Turner, said he was "quite happy to proceed" with dealing with the time limit arguments in legal submissions for the adjudicator to consider.
However, the question of his client's legal standing to bring the Employees Act penalisation claim would require oral evidence, he said.
"I can’t agree to every single legal point you can come up with and be bound by it," Mr Turner said.
Mr Lowey argued that it was for the adjudicator, Jim Dolan, to decide.
Mr Dolan gave the parties six weeks each to make submissions on the preliminary matters and adjourned the case.
The hearing today was attended by the trade union union's acting general secretary Jonathan Hogan, and its former general secretary Gerry Light, who stepped down in June this year.
Mr Gibney, who did not address the tribunal today, was accompanied by Mandate staff shop steward Sandra Stapleton.
Mandate represents retail and hospitality staff, including most of the workers involved in the long-running dispute over closure and liquidation of Debenhams Retail Ireland Ltd.
