Section 5 of the Unfair Dismissals Act 1977 – Dismissal by way of lock-out or for taking part in strike

(a) the employee was not permitted to resume his employment on terms and conditions at least as favourable to the employee as those specified in paragraph (a) or (b) of subsection (1) of section 7 of this Act, and

(b) one or more other employees in the same employment were so permitted.

(a) one or more employees of the same employer who took part in the strike or other industrial action were not dismissed for so taking part, or

(b) one or more of such employees who were dismissed for so taking part were subsequently permitted to resume their employment on terms and conditions at least as favourable to the employees as those specified in the said paragraph (a) or (b) and the employee was not.

(2A) Without prejudice to the applicability of any of the provisions of section 6 to the case, where—

(a) an employee—

(i) is deemed by subsection (1) to have been dismissed by reason of a lock-out, or

(ii) is dismissed for taking part in a strike or other industrial action,

and

(b) none of those who were locked out, or took part in the strike or industrial action, were re-engaged,

in determining whether, in those circumstances, the dismissal is an unfair dismissal, the adjudication officer or the Labour Court, as the case may be, shall have regard, for that purpose only, to—

(i) the reasonableness or otherwise of the conduct (whether by act or omission) of the employer or employee in relation to the dismissal,

(ii) the extent (if any) of the compliance or failure to comply by the employer with the procedure referred to in section 14(1),

(iii) the extent (if any) of the compliance or failure to comply by the employer or the employee with provisions of any code of practice referred to in section 7(2)(d), and

(iv) whether the parties have adhered to any agreed grievance procedures applicable to the employment in question at the time of the lock-out, strike or industrial action.

“lock-out” means an action which, in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute (within the meaning of the Industrial Relations Act, 1946), is taken by one or more employers, whether parties to the dispute or not, and which consists of the exclusion of one or more employees from one or more factories, offices or other places of work or of the suspension of work in one or more such places or of the collective, simultaneous or otherwise connected termination or suspension of employment of a group of employees;

“the original employer” means, in relation to the employee, the employer who dismissed the employee.