The number of Irish employees complaining of being bullied in the workplace is on the increase, an ESRI survey to be published next month will reveal.
The survey, commissioned by the Government Taskforce on the Prevention of Workplace Bullying, will show that 8 per cent of workers say they have problems at work, compared with 7 per cent of employees who said they were victims of bullying in the last such survey carried out in 2001.
The results come as The Irish Timeshas learned that moves are under way to bring public service workers under the full remit of the Government's workplace anti-bullying code of practice for the first time due to concern at the high number of bullying complaints from the public sector, notably in hospitals and schools.
Minister of State for Labour Affairs Tony Killeen has written to Minister for Finance Brian Cowen, urging him to extend the scope of the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) code of practice for employers and employees on the prevention and resolution of bullying at work to cover all public sector workers.
Currently, the code of practice that applies to the workforce generally - which is being updated by the HSA following a request from Mr Killeen - does not give public service staff the right to have their cases referred ultimately to the Labour Court.