'Any reasonable employer would have dismissed' - Insurance sales agent sacked for use of 'N' word

However, WRC Adjudication Officer, Catherine Byrne has found that the decision last April to dismiss the worker for gross misconduct on March 26 last was not unfair.

In her findings, Ms Byrne said that “the use of the word ’n*****r’ is a universally understood to be pejorative, a demeaning insult and a racial slur”.

She stated: “It is intended to 'put down' an individual because they are not white and, even if not heard by the subject, it is never not offensive."

Ms Byrne said that it is her view that having uncovered the facts in the case “any reasonable employer would have dismissed the complainant”.

A company investigation into the incident concluded that the sales agent used the same insulting remark about another colleague on March 26 and 27, 2019.

The investigation also found that on a date unknown, she repeated this racial insult when she showed a colleague a video on her phone depicting two black men fighting.

The sales agent claimed that her dismissal related to a concern she raised about a sales strategy introduced by her employer.

However, in her findings, Ms Byrne found that there was no connection between the sales strategy and the sales agent’s dismissal.

The woman joined the company as a sales agent on December 5, 2016, and was dismissed on April 17, 2019, for gross misconduct.

The woman’s dismissal stemmed from a colleague reporting to the company’s Human Resources (HR) department that on the day previous on March 26, 2019, he heard the sales agent referring to another employee as a “n****r,” saying to him, “go back to your side N****r,” meaning, go back to your side of the office.

The person reporting the incident said that it wasn’t the first time he witnessed the complainant using this term in relation to a black employee.

The sales agent was suspended from work pending an investigation into what had been alleged.

The company - represented in the case by Dublin-based solicitors, Flynn O’Donnell Solicitors - mounted an investigation and interviewed the sales agent and the person who was the subject of the racial slur.

The person who was subject of the racial slur told the company investigator that he and the complainant engaged in slagging all the time and that “she didn’t mean any offence”.

When he heard the term “n****r,” he said that he was taken aback and he told the sales agent not to say it again.

Two other employees who were in the area when the complainant made her comment were also interviewed by the company investigator.

One said that it was clear that the man who was subject to the racial slur felt that the comment “went too far” and that the four colleagues who heard it were shocked and stunned.

The employee said that he heard the complainant referring to a different black employee as a “n****r” on another occasion.

When interviewed, the sales agent stated that she called her male work colleague a “n***a” and not a “n****r,” and that they engaged in banter all the time and that they had a very open relationship.

The sales agent said that her comment wasn’t said “in a bad way” but that she could see how it seemed offensive and she apologised.

She stated that her male colleague was fine the next morning and the banter resumed.

The sales agent said that she could understand how she might be “taken up wrong when someone is not used to how we are together.”

She told the company that her male colleague did not make a complaint about her comments and that it was a matter of interpretation as to whether he was offended.

The woman said that several employees sent her messages to say that they have no problem working alongside her.

At a disciplinary meeting, the company’s HR Manager told the sales agent that other information had come to light in the course of the investigation including other references to colleagues as “n****rs.”

The investigator’s report into the incident found that the sales agent herself “confirmed she used the word in reference to another member of staff although she would argue a slightly lesser connotation”.

The report states: “I believe that in this instance she said it more than once. I believe she confirmed it to another member of staff and I believe she has used it in reference to black employees and in reference to black people previously on site.”

The insurance company argued that the decision to dismiss the worker was “entirely reasonable in all the circumstances”.

The company stated that there was a fundamental breakdown in the trust and confidence that the company had placed in the sales agent “as it became clear during the investigation and disciplinary process that there had been other instances of racial comments and inappropriate behaviour by the complainant”.