A FORMER Ryanair pilot who claimed he was harassed and denied promotion when he refused to sign a bond repudiating industrial regulations complaints against the airline has lost his claim for constructive dismissal.
An Employment Appeals Tribunal has found that there was no breach by Ryanair of pilot Joe Peard’s contract of employment “express, implied or otherwise”.
In a 37-page determination yesterday, the tribunal also found that Mr Peard’s decision to leave Ryanair in June 2007, prior to invoking the grievance procedure, was “not a reasonable one”. “Whilst the tribunal is sympathetic to the claimant and considers him to have been honest and honourable in pursuing the case, his claim in law must fail.”
The tribunal said Ryanair was perfectly entitled to determine the appropriate legal criteria for promotion.
“If one of those criteria was that those who maintained claims against the company would not be eligible for promotion, they were within their legal rights to do so.”
The tribunal found Mr Peard “was never going to be allowed the opportunity of promotion” while he maintained his claims.
It found evidence from a Ryanair representative that there was nothing blocking Mr Peard from progressing and there was a possibility that he would have been promoted as “simply not credible”.
Mr Peard, who now works with the Emirates airline in Dubai, claimed constructive dismissal under three headings: deliberate underpayment, manipulation of the roster and denial of promotion.
The tribunal said Mr Peard had failed to establish that there was a deliberate underpayment of his wages and a manipulation of the roster and had also failed to show that they were connected to his decision to resign.
It said the main issue in the case was Ryanair’s refusal to allow Mr Peard to enter into the “command upgrade process” without first signing the company bond.
In reality this meant he was barred from the promotion process while he had claims against the airline.
The issue first arose in 2006 and the tribunal described the correspondence that went back and forth between the parties from that juncture, up and until Mr Peard’s resignation, as “remarkable”.
It says Ryanair “entered into a game of cat and mouse” with Mr Peard, “taking advantage of his naivety and loyalty to his union”. However, it was surprised that, under cross-examination, Mr Peard was “unable to confirm the number, type and status of any of the claims”.