WRC Discrimination Complaints Soar to 915 in 2025, Up 52% on Disability Claims

Complaints of discrimination to the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) increased by over half to 915 in 2025. This includes 622 complaints under the Employment Equality Acts, a 52% rise from 410 in 2023, concerning discrimination or lack of accommodation for workers with disabilities. An additional 293 disability complaints were made regarding goods and services.

Worker complaints have nearly doubled since 2023, when there were 331. Disability complaints alone accounted for almost a third of all WRC complaints under the Acts, which cover nine grounds including age, gender, and sexual orientation. Recent cases include Lidl ordered to pay €28,000 to a warehouse worker for disability discrimination, a €30,000 award for a senior civil servant with visual impairment, and €106,000 to a sales worker for age and disability discrimination.

Complaints related to family status and gender rose by 32% and 24% respectively. Religion-based complaints increased by 31%. Under the Equal Status Acts, disability complaints concerning goods, services, and accommodation were up 53% from 192 in 2024 to 293 in 2025, making up about a quarter of all cases. Other categories with substantial increases were gender (49%), family status (36%), and civil status (29%). Complaints regarding the Travelling community dropped by over half to 105. Race was the second most cited factor in equal-status complaints, with 236 in 2025, up from 105 in 2023 and a 10% increase on 2024.

The WRC pursued 223 cases through courts in 2025, securing 183 convictions against 78 businesses or owners. Almost a third of these offenses (59 of 183) involved abuses of the Employment Permits Acts, primarily in the food sector, concerning non-EU/EEA workers.