Employment Law in Ireland: Pay, Leave, Dismissal and the WRC

Employment law in Ireland is not one single code. It is a set of separate Acts, each covering one piece of the employment relationship: pay, leave, dismissal, redundancy, and the vetting and permit rules that decide who can start work at all. Almost every dispute among these Acts ends up in the same place, the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), so understanding what the WRC handles and when you must complain to it matters more than any single number.

Two questions decide most of what applies to you: how long have you worked there, and what kind of worker are you. Service length gates entitlements throughout Irish employment law, from the 13 weeks needed for statutory sick pay, to the 104 weeks needed for statutory redundancy pay, to the 12 months normally needed to claim unfair dismissal. Separately, some workers face rules before they can even take up a job, such as needing an employment permit or a Garda vetting disclosure, that have nothing to do with service length at all.

This hub orients you across both sides of that employment relationship, starting a job and the checks that gate it, working life and what you are paid and owed, and leaving a job, whether by notice, redundancy, or dismissal, plus how to enforce any of it through the WRC.

Information last verified on 21 July 2026. This page presents general legal information, not legal advice.

Jurisdiction scope: This hub covers employment law in the Republic of Ireland: the Workplace Relations Commission system, statutory pay and leave entitlements, notice, redundancy, unfair dismissal, employment permits, Garda vetting and spent convictions. It does not cover Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom, or any other jurisdiction. It is general information, not advice for your situation.

Starting a job: permits, vetting and your criminal record

Before some people can even start work in Ireland, the law asks two separate questions that have nothing to do with the job itself: are you allowed to work here, and can you work with children or vulnerable adults.

If you need permission to work in Ireland, the answer usually runs through the employment permits system. Under the framework of the Employment Permits Act 2024, the Department sets the salary thresholds administratively, and from 1 March 2026 they are €36,605 for a General Employment Permit and €40,904 for a Critical Skills Employment Permit. These figures are set by departmental roadmap rather than fixed in the Act, so check the current rate before relying on it. A General permit normally requires a Labour Market Needs Test, 28 days of advertising the role, while a Critical Skills permit does not, and leads to a Stamp 4 permission after two years instead of a renewal. The Act also bans an employer from deducting permit, recruitment or travel costs from a permit holder's pay, a criminal offence if breached.

Separately, anyone doing relevant work with children or vulnerable adults needs Garda vetting. You cannot apply for it yourself: it only runs through a registered employer, school, club or umbrella body, using the e-vetting portal at vetting.garda.ie. Processing usually takes 5 to 8 working days, and a disclosure shows convictions, pending prosecutions and any specified information, though most come back nil.

A past conviction does not necessarily follow you forever. Under the spent convictions rules, a single conviction can become spent 7 years after the effective date, provided every sentence or order was completed and the person was 18 or over when the offence happened. Only one conviction can ever become spent under this Act; a second conviction takes the whole record outside the scheme, with a limited road traffic and public order exception. A spent conviction does not have to be disclosed, but Garda vetting runs on a separate, narrower test that only excludes District Court convictions and is not affected by whether a conviction is spent.

Pay, sick leave and family leave while you are working

Once you are working, several statutory floors apply regardless of what your contract says, though a contract can always improve on them.

The national minimum wage is €14.15 an hour for workers aged 20 and over from 1 January 2026, dropping to €12.74 at 19, €11.32 at 18 and €9.91 under 18. Interns and work-trial participants must also be paid at least this rate, though statutory apprentices and close relatives of the employer are excluded. An employer can only offset board and lodging against pay at fixed rates, €1.27 an hour for board and €33.42 a week for lodging, never at whatever they choose.

Statutory sick pay stays at 5 days in 2026, paid at 70% of normal daily pay capped at €110 a day, after 13 weeks of continuous service. The Government had planned to raise this to 7 days in 2025 and 10 days in 2026, but confirmed in April 2025 that it would remain at 5 days. Every day claimed needs a medical certificate from day one, and once the 5 days are used, Illness Benefit from the Department of Social Protection may apply instead.

Family leave in Ireland runs across several separate entitlements, set out in the maternity, paternity and parent's leave guide. Maternity leave is 26 weeks plus up to 16 further unpaid weeks, with Maternity Benefit of €299 a week for the paid period in 2026. Paternity leave is 2 weeks, paid at the same €299 weekly rate, and must start within 26 weeks of the birth or adoption. Parent's leave is 9 weeks per parent in the child's first 2 years, having risen from 7 to 9 weeks on 1 August 2024 with no further increase since. Parental leave is separate and unpaid, 26 weeks per child usually needing a year's service and 6 weeks' written notice, to be taken before the child turns 12, or 16 if the child has a disability or long-term illness. Dismissing someone for pregnancy or for taking any of this leave is automatically unfair, with no minimum service required to claim.

Leaving a job: notice, redundancy and unfair dismissal

How a job ends decides which rules apply, and Irish law treats notice, redundancy and dismissal as three separate questions.

Notice periods run on a statutory scale from 1 week, once you have 13 weeks' service, up to 8 weeks after 15 years or more. A contract can lengthen this scale but can never shorten it below the statutory minimum. An employee who resigns generally owes only 1 week's notice once they have 13 weeks' service, unless their own contract says otherwise, and pay in lieu of notice is allowed where both sides agree to it.

Where a role is being eliminated rather than filled, statutory redundancy pay applies once an employee has 104 weeks (2 years) of continuous service. The formula is 2 weeks' gross pay per year of service plus 1 bonus week, with weekly pay capped at €600, and the resulting lump sum is tax free. If an employer cannot pay, the Social Insurance Fund pays the statutory amount through the Department of Social Protection instead.

Where an employee believes they were dismissed unfairly rather than made genuinely redundant, the unfair dismissal rules usually require 12 months' continuous service to claim, though pregnancy, family leave, trade union activity, asserting minimum wage rights or making a protected disclosure are automatically unfair with no service requirement at all. The burden of proof favours the employee: a dismissal is presumed unfair unless the employer shows substantial grounds for it. Compensation is capped at 104 weeks' (2 years') pay, rising to 5 years' pay for protected-disclosure dismissals, though a claimant with no financial loss can recover no more than 4 weeks' pay.

Enforcing any of this: the Workplace Relations Commission

Every entitlement above is only as real as your ability to enforce it, and in Ireland that almost always means the WRC.

A WRC complaint is made through the online complaint form at workplacerelations.ie, and must normally be lodged within 6 months of the alleged breach, extendable to 12 months for reasonable cause. Redundancy-payment disputes get a longer window, 1 year from the date of dismissal, extendable to 2 years. Evidence must reach the adjudicator and the other side at least 15 working days before the hearing, and the WRC can try mediation before a full adjudication hearing.

A WRC decision can be appealed to the Labour Court within 42 days; after that it becomes legally binding. An employer then has 56 days to comply, after which the District Court can be asked to enforce the decision. This same complaint process, not a separate court claim, is how notice, redundancy, sick pay, minimum wage and unfair dismissal disputes are all actually decided in practice.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need to hire an Irish employer registered specifically for permits, or can any company sponsor an employment permit?

The employer applying for an employment permit on your behalf must be a genuinely trading Irish business. The Employment Permits Act 2024 also bars any employer from deducting permit, recruitment or travel costs from your pay. The older Trusted Partner Initiative no longer operates as a separate faster queue: since the move to Employment Permits Online every employer verifies its Revenue and CRO details through its portal account, and applications are processed in date order within each permit type.

How long does Garda vetting take in 2026?

Completed applications are usually processed within 5 to 8 working days, according to the Garda National Vetting Bureau, though you can only apply through a registered employer or organisation, never on your own.

Is the Irish minimum wage the same for everyone?

No. The full rate of €14.15 an hour from 1 January 2026 applies only to workers aged 20 and over. Younger workers get a fixed percentage of that rate: €12.74 at 19, €11.32 at 18 and €9.91 under 18.

How much notice am I entitled to if I am let go?

Statutory notice runs from 1 week, once you have 13 weeks' service, up to 8 weeks after 15 or more years of service. Your contract can set a longer notice period but can never legally shorten it below this scale.

How long do I have to bring a WRC complaint?

Most complaints, including unfair dismissal and minimum wage claims, must be lodged within 6 months of the alleged breach, extendable to 12 months where there is reasonable cause for the delay. Redundancy payment disputes get a longer window of 1 year, extendable to 2 years.

Does a spent conviction ever have to be disclosed to an employer?

Once a conviction is spent under the 2016 Act, you are not required to disclose it and a question about previous convictions is treated as not applying to it. Garda vetting for work with children or vulnerable adults runs on a separate test that is not affected by whether a conviction is spent.