Sacked shop steward allowed to continue protest outside union building
Thursday, 11 September 2008
A sacked Belfast International Airport shop steward is to be allowed to continue to protest outside his former union's building.
Ballymena man Gordon McNeill appeared at the High Court last week after breaching an injunction during a protest on August 28 which prevented him from entering Transport House in Belfast.
After receiving clarification from His Honour Mr Justice Deeney, Mr McNeill is legally entitled to pursue his public protest on the footpath outside.
However, the consequences of a further breach were also stressed, with imprisonment possible. Mr McNeill has been in dispute with the union and has undertaken hunger strikes on the building's porch roof along with two other former shop stewards - Madan Gupta and Chris Bowyer - on a number of occasion in the past twelve months.
In 2002, he was part of over twenty security staff sacked from the airport. Five years later they were eventually awarded hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation when an industrial tribunal found they had been unfairly dismissed after they went on strike in a row over pay with their employer ICTS.
The tribunal also ruled that four shop stewards, including Mr McNeill, had been unlawfully discriminated against.
The case had been taken independently of the union and the sacked stewards demanded that the union meet their legal and other costs, while they were also critical of how the union had handled the dispute with ICTS.
The union have since admitted that the original dispute in 2002 was not handled correctly but stressed that from 2003 it has "done all in its power to support members" and bring the issue to an "honourable conclusion".
It has also stated that all legal costs have been paid and that they had put forward a generous offer of compensation to the shop stewards.
In June this year, the union subsequently came to an agreement with Mr Gupta and Mr Bowyer over compensation and the two men signed a confidentiality agreement.
However, Mr McNeill has accused the union of trying to "bribe him into submission" and has demanded that he is paid the compensation without having to sign up to confidentiality.
The Chancery Court heard last week that the injunction, granted on April 8 2008 for ATGWU, stated that Mr McNeill was not "to remain on the roof or otherwise in or at Transport House, 102 High Street, Belfast, or otherwise interfere with the plaintiff's privacy or peaceful enjoyment of the said land and property".
For the ATGWU, Michael McGarvey stated: "The plaintiff is not seeking for the defendant to be imprisoned. The plaintiff is seeking that the importance of the injunction be impressed to the defendant."
Mr McGarvey explained that Mr McNeill had resumed his protest on August 28 and that he had "returned to the premises and stood within the grounds". It was also claimed that McNeill had "a banner attached to railings".
He added: "When contempt proceedings were served, he was in the confines of the plaintiff's premises and that is accepted by the defendant".
Defending, Mr Canavan noted that the "purpose of an injunction is not to have a club in your back pocket".
He explained that his client had not intended to enter the property, that the door to the building is set some way off the street and that his client had been sitting in a deckchair under the entrance canopy.
He said: "He was sheltering from the inclement weather and he accepts this was then a breach.
“The importance of the injunction has been strongly presented to him. He has made a unreserved apology for breaching the injunction and accepts entirely that any future conduct must abide by the law and with the injunction."
However, the solicitor asked for clarification as to where his client could or could not stand in relation to the injunction.
