A former bouncer at Dublin’s biggest gay bar, The George, has denied to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) that he pushed a transgender woman down a flight of stairs at the venue during pride month last summer.
The former employee, Ellison Silva dos Santos, has alleged in a complaint under the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 that the venue’s general manager fired him two days after the incident and that his employer refused to hear his side of the story.
He claims the customer “threw herself” down the stairs to cause a scene after slapping him in the face.
The management of the venue, the Mercantile Entertainment Group Ltd, has denied sacking him at this point and says he failed to attend when rostered for work in the weeks that followed at the George and its other venues, including the Nolita cocktail bar on George’s Street and the Opium nightclub on Wexford Street.
The respondent’s position that he was not dismissed over the incident and was offered alternative work in the wider hospitality group is disputed by the complainant, who claims he was only contracted to work at The George.
Mr Silva dos Santos said that while he was at work at the bar on the night of Wednesday 28th June last year he had encountered a transgender woman who had too much to drink and asked her to come with him to another location so they could speak.
Giving evidence via an interpreter, he said the patron complied at first but then “went the other direction” and he “tried to touch [her] to come on to this direction”.
“The client didn’t like and slapped him in the face. After [being] slapped in the face he grabbed her arm and conducted her downstairs. She was trying to fight to him, but she don’t fall too much because he was holding her,” the interpreter said.
Mr Silva dos Santos’s evidence was that the patron tried to kick him twice after she went to the floor.
He said he explained what happened to the duty manager when the man came to the scene, including that the patron had slapped him in the face. “He tell everything. The manager screamed at him asking him to leave the situation and just go out,” the interpreter said.
CCTV footage of the incident was shown to adjudicator Marie Flynn by the Mercantile Group’s HR manager, Holly Kiely while the complainant was being cross-examined.
John Keenan, a HR consultant representing the company, told Mr Silva dos Santos: “You did actually push the lady, it’s quite clear.”
“No,” Mr Silva dos Santos said.
“You deny it,” Mr Keenan said.
“It’s your opinion, I respect that, but I don’t push,” the complainant said.
“The duty manager on the night he attended, said there were actually two pushes; the lady found herself on the steps twice before she went out,” Mr Keenan said.
“She didn’t fall, she throw herself,” the complainant said.
“Ah right, so she threw herself,” Mr Keenan said.
“She was trying [to] escape, it’s like she was trying to make a drama,” the complainant said.
Mr Silva dos Santos said that he met the general manager, Darragh Flynn, two days later in the nightclub’s smoking area and was told: “You are fired.”
His position is that his employment ended at that point.
Mr Flynn denied this and said the complainant came to the meeting and told him: “Either I’m working tonight, or I’m fired.”
He said he put three concerns about what had happened to the doorman, namely that the complainant was “over-aggressive” in dealing with the customer; that he wouldn’t follow the duty manager’s directions; and that he left work early without permission.
“[He] didn’t accept he’d done anything wrong, he requested to see the CCTV, I agreed, we went upstairs and watched the footage,” he said.
“He felt he was perfectly entitled to push her down the stairs ... he had no remorse,” Mr Flynn said. “I didn’t feel comfortable with him working in the George,” the manager added.
He said he told the complainant he would contact the group’s security manager about arranging work in other venues. However, Mr Silva dos Santos was later given a roster that included some work at the George, Mr Flynn added.
Group HR manager, Ms Kiely, said she issued the worker with a warning letter the following week – a sanction the complainant said had been meted out without her having heard his side of the story.
She said she wrote a number of times to the complainant about not attending for any rostered work before terminating his contract on August 11th, 2023 because he had abandoned his employment.
Mr Keenan, for the company, submitted an email from the complainant to Ms Kiely on December 20th, 2023 seeking a “compensatory figure” of €23,440.
“At any point did you propose matters could be resolved through a payment to [the complainant],” he asked.
“We said we would like to actively resolve the issue but there was no payment offered,” Ms Kiely said.
Closing his case, Mr Keenan said: “I say it is plain as the nose on your face that there was no dismissal here. I have to put it that the claim ultimately before the WRC is about seeking an opportunity – using [the incident] as an opportunity to get compensatory payment.”
The adjudicator said she will issue her decision in “due course”.
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