Can you be made redundant while on maternity leave or sick leave in Ireland?

Redundancy during maternity leave or sick leave sits where three Acts meet: the Redundancy Payments Acts, the Unfair Dismissals Acts and the Maternity Protection Acts, with the Employment Equality Acts alongside. The short version is that maternity leave gives you a hard protection against notice being served, pregnancy and leave give you a route to the WRC with no service requirement, and sick leave gives you no special protection but the usual tests of genuineness and fair selection. In every case the statutory sum is worked out on your normal pay.

Maternity leave: notice cannot be served

The Maternity Protection Acts 1994 to 2022 make any notice of termination given during maternity leave, additional maternity leave, or certain related absences void. That covers the 26 weeks of paid maternity leave, the 16 weeks of additional unpaid leave if you take them, and time off for antenatal and postnatal care and breastfeeding.

So your employer cannot serve notice of redundancy while you are on maternity leave. It can tell you that a restructuring is under way, consult you about it, and even tell you that your role is proposed for redundancy. But the notice period cannot start until you return. If an employer tries to serve notice during leave, the notice has no effect and your employment continues.

This protection is about the notice, not the existence of a redundancy. A genuine redundancy that affects your role can still happen; it just cannot be put into effect against you until your leave ends. In practice employers sometimes agree a later termination date, or keep the person on the payroll until the return date and serve notice then.

On return from maternity leave you are entitled to return to the same job, or if that is not reasonably practicable, to suitable alternative work on terms not less favourable. An employer that cannot offer either because the role has gone needs to show that the redundancy is real and that it looked for alternatives.

Pregnancy, maternity and the 12-month rule

Normally you need 12 months' continuous service to claim unfair dismissal. There is no minimum service where the dismissal is wholly or mainly for:

• pregnancy, giving birth or breastfeeding;
• taking or asking for maternity, adoptive, paternity, parent's, parental, carer's or force majeure leave.

So someone with four months' service who is let go while pregnant can bring an unfair dismissal claim. The employer then has to show that the dismissal was for a different reason, and a redundancy that coincides with a pregnancy is examined closely: was the role genuinely gone, were others in the pool treated the same way, was the timing explained.

A dismissal connected with pregnancy or maternity may also be discrimination on the gender ground under the Employment Equality Acts 1998 to 2015, where compensation can be up to two years' pay and is not limited to financial loss. You choose which Act to claim under; you cannot recover twice for the same dismissal. The awards register shows what adjudicators have ordered.

Redundancy on sick leave

There is no equivalent bar on serving notice during sick leave. An employer can make an employee on sick leave redundant, and the WRC has accepted that in a genuine restructuring the absent employee is treated like anyone else.

What the WRC looks at:

• Was the redundancy genuine? The role has to have gone. A sick employee whose work is handed to a replacement has not been made redundant.
• Was the selection fair? Selection criteria that score attendance will count sick leave against you. The WRC has treated criteria that penalise certified sick leave, and in particular leave connected with a disability, as unfair. Ask for the criteria and your scores in writing.
• Were you consulted? Being on sick leave is not a reason to skip consultation. The employer should write to you, offer a meeting at a time and place that suits your health, and give you the chance to respond and to suggest alternatives.
• Is the illness a disability? If so, the Employment Equality Acts require reasonable accommodation, and dismissal may be discrimination on the disability ground. Mental health conditions can be disabilities.

The employer owes you your minimum notice at full pay even though you are on sick leave (the bands are in the notice guide), and the statutory sum is calculated on your normal pay. The lead guide covers what a genuine redundancy and a fair selection look like.

Other protected leave

The same principles apply to paternity, parent's, parental, carer's, adoptive and force majeure leave. The relevant Acts protect your employment during the leave, you are entitled to return to your job afterwards, and dismissal for taking the leave needs no minimum service for an unfair dismissal claim. Parental leave in particular: the Parental Leave Acts treat a notice served during the leave as void in the same way as maternity leave, so check the Act that covers your leave.

How the sum is worked out

The Redundancy Payments Acts 1967 to 2014 base the lump sum on your normal weekly pay at the date of termination. Reduced pay while on leave does not count against you. So:

• weeks on Maternity Benefit (€299 a week in 2026) with no employer top-up do not lower the figure;
• weeks on statutory sick pay at 70% of pay, capped at €110 a day, do not lower it;
• weeks on Illness Benefit with no pay from the employer do not lower it;
• a temporary reduction in hours for health reasons does not lower it if your normal hours are the contractual ones.

The formula is the usual one: two weeks' pay for every year of continuous service plus one bonus week, with weekly pay capped at €600, tax-free. Maternity leave, additional maternity leave, sick leave and the other statutory leaves all count as continuous service for the 104-week threshold and for the years in the formula.

A worked example: you have 5 years and 146 days of service, your normal pay is €640 a week, and you are on the 16 weeks of unpaid additional maternity leave when the employer tells you the role is to go. Notice is served on your return. Reckonable years: 5 + 146 ÷ 365 = 5.4. Weeks: 5.4 × 2 + 1 = 11.8. Weekly pay capped at €600. Lump sum: 11.8 × €600 = €7,080, tax-free. The notice period after your return adds to the service too, and the end date for the formula is the date the notice ends. The calculator explainer sets out the counting and the redundancy calculator does the arithmetic.

Timing and the WRC clock

Two different clocks can run.

• Unfair dismissal or discrimination. 6 months from the date of dismissal (the date your notice ends), extendable to 12 for reasonable cause and never beyond. Being on leave does not stop the clock, although it can be part of a reasonable cause argument. The deadline checker works the date out.
• The statutory sum not paid. A complaint under the Redundancy Payments Acts; treat the general 6-month rule as your deadline.

If notice was served during maternity leave, it is void and the dismissal has not yet happened, so the clock has not started. That is worth confirming with a union official or a solicitor rather than assuming, because it affects when you need to act.

What to do if it happens

1. Ask for everything in writing: the reason for the redundancy, the selection criteria and your scores, the alternatives considered, and the proposed dates.
2. Check the notice date against your leave dates. If notice was served during maternity leave, say so in writing and keep the letter.
3. Check the calculation against your normal pay, not your leave pay.
4. Reply to the consultation, even from home: suggest alternatives, ask about other roles, and ask for the decision to be deferred until you return if you are on maternity leave.
5. Note the 6-month clock from the date your notice ends.

Where this leaves you

The redundancy calculator works out the statutory sum on your normal pay from your start date, the date your notice ends and your normal weekly pay, and shows the notice you are owed alongside. If notice was served during maternity leave, if the selection seems to rest on your absence, or if the illness is a disability, the position may go well beyond the statutory sum and a solicitor should look at it; the enquiry page explains how that works on this site.