Ryanair has secured leave from the High Court to bring a challenge to a decision of a Rights Commissioner that he has jurisdiction to hear complaints by a Ryanair pilot that he was being victimised by the airline.
Martin Hayden SC, for Ryanair, was yesterday granted leave by Mr Justice Liam McKechnie to bring the judicial review proceedings against Rights Commissioner Tony Bregazzi with Peter Gallagher, a Ryanair pilot, as notice party to the action.
Ryanair wants to overturn a decision of Mr Bregazzi of February 2nd that he had jurisdiction to hear the complaint of Mr Gallagher. The airline contends that Mr Bregazzi acted in breach of fair procedures in arriving at his decision on jurisdiction.
It says that fair procedures were not adhered to in that there was no witness from Ryanair who supported Mr Gallagher's assertions present at the hearing before Mr Bregazzi. Nor was any such witness requested to attend, it says.
It contends Ryanair had no opportunity therefore to properly challenge the claims being made by Mr Gallagher.
The proceedings arise from a decision by the trade union Impact, of which the Irish Airline Pilots Association is a part, of November 17th, 2004, to apply to the Labour Relations Commission to investigate a claim of victimisation of Mr Gallagher.
On November 18th, 2004, Impact applied to the LRC to investigate allegations of victimisation of two other Ryanair pilots.
Ryanair said its position is that it does not accept there is a trade dispute between it and Impact or that Impact was entitled to "intermeddle" in Ryanair's affairs. It did not accept it was compelled as an employer to negotiate with a trade union or to accept the imposition of any particular trade union as the mechanism through which it must negotiate with its employees.
It was Ryanair's view that the complaint brought against the airline was part of a bigger strategy to use legislation to force trade union recognition, the judge was told.
The court also heard that similar issues have been raised in proceedings brought by Ryanair against the Labour Court on which judgment has been reserved by Mr Justice Michael Hanna. Ryanair said the Rights Commissioner had been made aware of that case and had reserved a decision on whether he should postpone the proceedings before him pending Mr Justice Hanna's decision. However, Ryanair had had to come to court in the present case because time for a judicial review might elapse before Mr Justice Hanna delivered his judgment.
