An autistic man who undertook an unpaid trial day at a garden centre in Ireland has been awarded compensation for disability discrimination.
The man, whose name has not been disclosed by Ireland’s Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), applied for a part-time role at the centre in May 2024 through an agency.
He met with the manager and the accountant, and said he understood from the conversation that he had been taken on. He was told the pay would be €12 an hour, confirmed he could begin the following day, and was told: “Great, we’ll see you then.”
He arrived for work but told the hearing in Cork that he was left waiting until another employee came out of the office, saying she had been asked to look after him. He was asked to water plants and move bags of compost, and had “no supervision for most of the day”. He worked from 9am until 6pm.
He said the owner passed him twice without acknowledgement. “Everyone else looked at me funny, like they didn’t know who I was,” he said.
At the end of the shift, he was not told when he should return or what hours he would be working.
The following week, he received an email stating he was “not the right fit for the job”.
When he enquired about pay, he was told he would receive a €100 (£87.88) voucher as a “thank you”, which he said left him feeling “deeply devalued”.
“Nobody told me it was a test,” he told the WRC. His sister-in-law, who collected him afterwards, said he appeared “tired and confused”.
The complainant told the hearing that he had a strong employment history and could perform the advertised duties, provided he was given clear communication and basic support.
He had been referred to the garden centre by an agency specialising in supporting autistic people into work, and assumed the employer would have been aware of his disability.
His mother argued at the hearing that the recruitment process amounted to direct discrimination on the basis of disability, and a failure to provide reasonable adjustments under Ireland’s Employment Equality Acts 1998–2015.
The garden centre claimed it had not been informed of his disability, and therefore its obligations under equality law did not apply.
It said it had consulted an HR adviser to ensure proper recruitment practice and had acted openly throughout.
Thomas O’Driscoll, adjudication officer at WRC, found the garden centre had not provided convincing evidence to counter the claim that it failed to make accommodations for the worker’s disability.
“While I accept that the discrimination was not deliberate or malicious, it was the result of carelessness and a lack of procedural awareness, which is nonetheless prohibited under the Acts,” he said. “The respondent’s conduct displayed a lack of understanding of its obligations in relation to disability-inclusive recruitment and reasonable accommodation.”
He added that the claim the trial was intended as a “supportive opportunity” was not backed up by any documentation.
The adjudicator concluded that the business had discriminated against the worker and failed to provide reasonable accommodation during recruitment. The garden centre was ordered to pay €5,000 (£4,393.88) in compensation.
This piece is based on an article featured on Personnel Today
