A long-serving prosecuting solicitor in the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) claims he has suffered years of discrimination and victimisation since telling his employer he underwent treatment for alcohol addiction.
Michael Murphy (57), who currently works in the ODPP’s District Court section, says he has been sober since completing his treatment in early 2019.
He has complained to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) alleging discrimination contrary to the Employment Equality Acts on grounds of his disability – alcoholism – and associated co-morbidities, anxiety and depression. He also alleged victimisation since disclosing his disability in 2019.
The case was part-heard in late October last and is expected to return before a WRC adjudication officer in February.
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In submissions to the WRC, Mr Murphy said he has been employed at the ODPP for the past 22 years, worked in different sections of the organisation during that time and received consistently good performance reviews from managers.
Before undergoing treatment at the Rutland Centre, Dublin, in 2019, he said he hid his drinking from work colleagues, who expressed surprise when they learned subsequently of his addiction.
Mr Murphy said he originally told management he needed to take leave for stress and anxiety reasons but, on returning to work in February 2019 after an eight-week absence, immediately disclosed he had attended a residential treatment course for alcohol addiction.
He said “the atmosphere changed” soon after his disclosure.
He later noticed management was assigning murder cases to colleagues but never to him. His request in February 2021 for a transfer to another section was ignored while several colleagues, including some who had not sought a change, were moved on.
He applied for an internal post he believed he was well-qualified for but did not make the shortlist and was not offered mentorship roles with new employees, limiting his ability to gain managerial experience.
He felt his professional development was being blocked and he was being sidelined and described the experience as “humiliating”. Management never mentioned alcohol addiction to him or offered any follow-up support, he added.
He concluded he was being discriminated against because of his disability.
Mr Murphy, represented by barrister Tiernan Lowey at the WRC hearing, is due to be cross-examined on behalf of the ODPP when the hearing resumes before adjudicator Catherine Byrne on a date to be decided early next year.
In a brief written submission for the ODPP, law firm Byrne Wallace said a complaint in respect of discrimination may not be referred after six months from the date of the alleged discrimination.
Mr Murphy’s complaint submitted on April 7th, 2023, did not set out any act of discrimination that allegedly had occurred within the six months up to that date and also failed to establish facts from which discrimination might be presumed, it was stated.
Even if Mr Murphy established he has a disability, that was not sufficient to establish a prima facie case of discrimination on grounds of that disability, it was further submitted.
In a detailed response, Mr Murphy said the ODPP had failed to address his substantive claims and instead advanced “technical arguments”.
The facts, and evidence to be adduced, disclosed a “prima facie case of discrimination and/or victimisation”, he said.
He referred to legal authorities to the effect that alcoholism falls within the definition of disability and to an expert witness report by Prof Jo-Hanna Ivers, clinical psychologist and associate professor in addiction in the Department of Public Health and Primary Care in Trinity College Dublin.
Mr Murphy said the report was “highly critical” of the “inadequacy” of the ODPP’s support for him in the workplace and referred to an “urgent need” for tailored workplace accommodations to address his needs.
His “unsympathetic” workplace experience was described in the report as “a testament to the inadequacies and insensitivity of the prevailing attitudes and culture surrounding addiction”.
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