A finance manager at Irish Rail says his duties were “hacked down to nothing” after he made a protected disclosure nine years ago – and that he now spends most of his working week in a 121,000-a-year job reading newspapers, eating sandwiches and going for long walks.

“I’d say if I got something that requires me to do work once in a week I’d be thrilled,” Dermot Alastair Mills told the Workplace Relations Commission at a hearing yesterday.

He was giving evidence in a hearing into his complaint under the Protected Disclosures Act 2014, in which he alleges he was subjected to penalisation as a whistleblower after raising concerns about certain accounting matters at Irish Rail in 2014.

Irish Rail accepts Mr Mills made a protected disclosure but denies penalisation – arguing that the WRC only has jurisdiction to rule on the extent of any alleged penalisation as it relates to the complainant’s failure to secure a more senior post during a 2018 recruitment process.

Mr Mills’s representative, industrial relations consultant and former Irish Rail HR chief John Keenan, said his client was “still enduring penalisation” in his continuing employment because of the alleged reduction of his role.

Mr Mills gave evidence that he was given responsibility for capital budgets worth in the region of 250m from the turn of the millennium up to the economic collapse in 2006 and 2007, reported to the Irish Rail board, participated in board sub-committees, and was promoted in 2010.

However, he...

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