Ireland Laws: Employment, Renting, Inheritance, Privacy & More

Ireland runs one national legal system: one Oireachtas making the statutes, one court ladder from the District Court to the Supreme Court, and a set of specialist bodies (the WRC, the RTB, the DPC, Revenue) that decide most of the disputes ordinary people actually have. That makes Irish law easier to navigate than a federal system, but the details move constantly: the minimum wage changes every January, rent rules were rebuilt twice in twelve months, and defamation law was rewritten in 2026.

This hub collects every Republic of Ireland guide on RecordingLaw.com, organised by life area, along with free calculators built on the statutory formulas. Each guide is checked against the primary source: the Act or statutory instrument on irishstatutebook.ie, or the official guidance from the relevant State body.

Information last verified on 20 July 2026. Everything here is general legal information for the Republic of Ireland, not legal advice. Northern Ireland is a separate (UK) jurisdiction covered by our UK guides.

Working in Ireland

Employment rights generate more questions than any other area of Irish law, and almost all of them end up before the Workplace Relations Commission rather than a court. Start with the money: the national minimum wage sets the floor for every hour worked, and statutory sick pay covers your first days of illness at 70% of pay.

If your job is ending, three guides cover the essentials: statutory redundancy pay (two weeks per year plus a bonus week, which our free redundancy calculator works out in seconds), minimum notice periods under the 1973 Act, and unfair dismissal claims with their strict six-month window.

For disputes of any kind, the guide to bringing a WRC complaint walks through the online form, the hearing, and appeals to the Labour Court. Two more guides round out the cluster: maternity, paternity and parent's leave (with the €299 weekly benefit rate for 2026) and Garda vetting for anyone working with children or vulnerable adults.

Coming to work in Ireland from outside the EEA starts with employment permits, which covers the Critical Skills and General permits, the 2026 salary thresholds, and the rule that your employer cannot make you pay for the permit. If an old conviction is the worry, spent convictions explains when a conviction stops having to be disclosed, and how that differs from the separate Garda vetting test.

Renting a home

Irish tenancy law changed more between June 2025 and March 2026 than in the previous decade. The headline: Rent Pressure Zones no longer exist. A single national rent-control system now caps increases everywhere at 2% a year or CPI inflation, whichever is lower, and tenancies created from 1 March 2026 carry a six-year minimum duration.

The tenant rights overview maps the whole landscape, including the new distinction between smaller landlords (three or fewer tenancies) and larger ones, whose grounds for ending a tenancy are now sharply limited. When a tenancy is ending, the notice of termination guide has the full statutory tables (90 to 224 days for landlords, depending on tenancy length), and our notice period calculator gives the answer instantly.

Two more guides complete the cluster: eviction rules, covering valid grounds, RTB disputes and illegal lockouts, and deposits and landlord obligations, covering the one-month deposit cap, minimum standards, and how to get a deposit back through the RTB.

Wills, inheritance and later life

Ireland taxes the person who receives an inheritance, not the estate, which surprises almost everyone. The guide to inheritance and gift tax (CAT) explains the group thresholds, the 33% rate, and the lifetime aggregation rule that catches prior gifts; the free inheritance tax calculator shows the math on your own numbers.

When someone dies, the probate process guide covers the Grant of Probate, the SA.2 Statement of Affairs, fees, waiting times, and what happens on intestacy under the Succession Act 1965. Planning ahead, the enduring power of attorney guide explains the Decision Support Service regime that replaced wardship in 2023. And for nursing home costs, the Fair Deal scheme guide explains the 80%-of-income and 7.5%-of-assets contributions, the three-year cap on the family home, and the nursing home loan.

Privacy, recording and data protection

Privacy is this site's home turf, and Ireland is Europe's privacy capital: the Data Protection Commission in Dublin is lead regulator for most of Big Tech. Three long-standing guides cover the fundamentals: recording laws in Ireland (one-party consent for calls, with a GDPR overlay for everything else), Irish data privacy law (the Data Protection Act 2018 and the DPC), and Irish defamation law, freshly updated for the 2026 reform that abolished High Court juries and created a public-interest defence.

New in this cluster: how to make a GDPR complaint to the DPC, including what the DPC can and cannot do for you and the court route to compensation. Because Irish privacy law is EU law, the EU data privacy hub, what is GDPR, subject access requests, and EU adequacy decisions all apply directly to Ireland too.

Closest to home: home CCTV and doorbell cameras explains where the household exemption ends, what you become once a camera points beyond your own boundary, and what you can actually do about a neighbour camera pointed at your house. Two more guides cover the recording questions people ask most: recording conversations at work, including whether the WRC will actually admit a covert recording, and recording phone calls, where the real risk is usually sharing the recording rather than making it.

Defamation

Ireland rewrote its defamation law in 2026. Online defamation covers social media, reviews and anonymous posts, including the new Circuit Court order that can require a platform to identify an anonymous poster, and the free platform routes worth trying first. Making a defamation claim covers the claim itself: the one-year time limit, which court hears it, the defences you will face, the offer of amends, and the costs reality.

Driving

Most Irish motoring questions come down to two systems: penalty points and the fixed charge notice. The penalty points guide has the offence-by-offence table, the 12-point disqualification threshold (7 for learners and novice drivers) and the 28-day rule for when points actually land on your licence. The fixed charge notice guide explains the 28-day and 56-day escalation, how to nominate another driver, and what happens if you ignore one.

On specific offences: speeding fines covers the escalating amounts and the points difference between paying and being convicted, plus which of the 2025 speed-limit changes actually became law. Drink-driving limits sets out both blood-alcohol thresholds, both fixed-penalty bands, and why refusing to give a specimen carries a heavier disqualification than most drink-driving convictions. Newest of all: e-scooter law, legal since May 2024 under a strict 20 km/h, 400-watt, age-16 regime.

Consumer rights and money

If something you bought is faulty, start with your consumer rights and refunds under the Consumer Rights Act 2022, including the 30-day right to reject, the 12-month burden-of-proof rule, and the fact that sale and second-hand goods are covered too. To pursue a claim yourself, the small claims procedure handles claims up to €2,000 for a €25 fee, entirely online. If cost is the barrier, civil legal aid explains the means test, the contributions, and the categories the scheme does not cover. If a collector is chasing you, debt collection sets out what they may and may not do, when a debt becomes statute-barred after six years, and the personal-insolvency options.

Family and personal

Divorce in Ireland requires living apart for two of the previous three years, and, contrary to what many sites say, the Courts Service charges no fee for family law applications. Judicial separation and separation agreements covers the options before or instead of divorce. Unmarried couples should read cohabiting couples rights: the redress scheme has hard time limits and cohabitants get none of the tax treatment spouses do. And changing your name by deed poll explains the process, the fees, and why the Passport Service will not accept a deed poll on its own.

Everyday law

The XL Bully ban is the live one: importing, breeding and selling has been banned since 1 October 2024, and owning one without a Certificate of Exemption has been illegal since 1 February 2025. More broadly, dog control laws covers licences, the restricted-breeds list, microchipping and the strict liability owners carry for damage. Knife law sets out what you may carry and the penalties, including the 2024 increases and the common myth that Ireland has a minimum age to buy a knife. Two of the most common everyday disputes have their own guides: noise complaints, where the key fact is that Ireland has no statutory decibel limit or quiet hours at all, and management company fees for apartment owners dealing with an OMC.

Four more everyday guides: jury service, including the rule that your employer must keep paying you; trespass and squatters rights, covering both the criminal offences and what adverse possession actually requires; boundary disputes, where the key point is that Land Registry maps are not conclusive as to boundaries; and drone rules under the EU categories, with the privacy duties that follow once a drone camera captures identifiable people.

How Irish law works

A quick orientation for every guide above. Statutes are made by the Oireachtas (the Dáil and Seanad), with detail filled in by statutory instruments; the full text of both lives on irishstatutebook.ie. EU law applies directly, which is why GDPR needs no Irish restatement. The civil courts run by claim value: the District Court (small claims up to €2,000, civil claims to €15,000), the Circuit Court (to €75,000, plus family law and probate), and the High Court (unlimited, including defamation and judicial review), with appeals up to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court.

But most everyday disputes never see a courtroom. Employment complaints go to the WRC, tenancy disputes to the RTB, data protection complaints to the DPC, and tax questions to Revenue. Those four bodies decide the overwhelming majority of the matters covered in this hub, which is why every guide names the body that will actually hear your case, its current fees, and its time limits.

Frequently asked questions

Every guide in this hub is general legal information for the Republic of Ireland, verified against official sources on the date shown at the top of each page. It is not legal advice. For advice about your own situation, consult a solicitor; the Legal Aid Board and the Citizens Information network can help if cost is a barrier.