STAFF at Bunratty Castle and Folk Park staged a protest this past Thursday in support of a colleague who says she was asked to leave her workplace.
Caroline O’Sullivan, who worked at the iconic tourist attraction for 13 years, reached retirement age recently. She expressed a wish to continue working and was told she would be offered a new contract, as her original contract expired when she reached the age of 66.
“They offered me a contract but the terms and conditions were not as good (as the old contract). I consulted with my union and they were negotiating for me,” she told the Limerick Post.
“I was told that I should sign the contract by Monday. They (management) said that if I showed up for work on Tuesday, they would consider that I had accepted the new contract.
“I showed up for work on the basis that the negotiation was going on in the background. I didn’t sign the contract.”
Caroline said she began work in the reservations office as normal but a senior member of staff arrived in the office and asked her two colleagues who were working alongside her to leave.
“She told me I had to leave the office, that I wasn’t employed there any more. I explained about the new contract and what was said about me turning up on Tuesday.
“I said I wanted to make a phone call but she said I wasn’t allowed to do that from the office. I was escorted off the premises like I was a criminal. It was horrible”.
Colleagues of Caroline’s took time from their lunch break to stage the protest outside the gates of the folk park on Thursday last.
“This wasn’t a union organised thing, it was just people I work with who wanted to show support. They felt it was not the way I should have been treated after 13 years there. And it isn’t.”
A spokesperson for Clare Tourism Development DAC, the company which took over Bunratty from Shannon Heritage, said “the company cannot comment on individual cases”.