A Travellers’ rights advocate has received a discrimination case and should get €6,500 compensation and an apology from the pinnacle of JD Wetherspoons after the chain’s Dún Laoghaire pub refused to serve her a drink.
“I felt such an equal strolling into that pub, and horrible strolling out,” Margaret O’Leary informed Dublin District Court docket as she recalled her interplay with workers in The Forty Foot.
She described it as a big achievement when the director of her organisation, Southside Travellers Motion Group, obtained recognition for his or her work on 7 June final 12 months.
Ms O’Leary had been attending a civic perform hosted by former training minister Mary Hanafin, then Cathaoirleach of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council.
Later, she left the council constructing, crossed the highway and entered The Forty Foot pub, operated by JD Wetherspoons, the place she was refused a drink.
The previous authorities minister and a retired garda testified that Ms O’Leary had not been intoxicated on the evening.
Choose Nicola Jane Andrews discovered there was discrimination on Ms O’Leary’s particular evening and it was on the idea that she was a member of the Travelling neighborhood.
“And listening to Ms O’Leary within the field in proof, she is identifiable as a member of the travelling neighborhood; she is pleased with her accent as she needs to be,” Choose Andrews stated.
She ordered the pub chain to pay €6,500 to the claimant, plus authorized prices, and she or he directed the pinnacle of JD Wetherspoons to jot down a letter of apology to Ms O’Leary and the Southside Travellers Motion Group.
The applying was introduced below Part 19 of the Intoxicating Liquor Act 2003 and the Equal Standing Act 2000. Penalties can embrace non permanent closure of the premises or compensation on the district court docket.
Ms O’Leary informed her barrister Aoife Sheehan (instructed by Vincent Toher & Co solicitors) that she believed she was refused as a result of she was a Traveller.
Earlier, varied neighborhood organisations have been honoured on the council buildings, together with Geraldine Dunne, director of Southside Travellers Motion Group.
Ms O’Leary recalled she had two glasses of wine, and after the occasion, folks headed to The Forty Foot pub.
Nonetheless, she held again briefly to speak with Councillor Hanafin to say she saved a photograph taken along with her years in the past because the training minister.
She defined that she had left faculty early however later returned to training, and Ms Hanafin had come to her commencement.
Then she went to the pub to affix Geraldine Dunne, Ms Dunne’s husband, and others from the ceremony.
She entered alone and went to order a drink, however the first barman informed her, “Not tonight”, and “I am not serving you”.
An obligation supervisor from The Forty Foot, Jamie Malone, later refused to serve her, claiming she was too drunk and slurring her phrases, however the choose held that his proof was not credible.
Ms O’Leary stated that she pleaded with the barman to not embarrass her in entrance of the celebrated folks from the occasion earlier.
“I went again to the desk mortified,” she stated.
It was an vital day for her organisation; she defined: “You’re combating for Travellers’ and ladies’s rights, and you’re going towards the grain. I felt such an equal going into that pub and horrible strolling out.”
Her group went to a different institution within the locality.
Mary Hanafin testified that Ms O’Leary was “fully coherent and fully cogent”.
The politician despatched a written criticism to the pub chain after varied folks contacted her in a single day and the next day about what had occurred with Ms O’Leary in The Forty Foot after the awards.
Retired Garda JP Durkan was on the ceremony and within the pub afterwards; he stated she was “undoubtedly not drunk” and couldn’t have had greater than two glasses of wine.
Geraldine Dunne, her colleague, and Ms Dunne’s husband have been the one travellers there.
Ms Dunne agreed that she had been served a drink, however stated a member of the settled neighborhood had ordered the spherical.
Ms Sheehan submitted that there was no credible foundation to imagine that Ms O’Leary was drunk, given the unbiased proof of the councillor and retired Garda Durkan.
