Strike action at Meta’s Irish data center in Clonee has been temporarily called off, with the case instead going to the courts.

Local press including RTE and BreakingNews reported over the weekend that the Connect trade union has deferred a 24-hour work stoppage that was due to start today (October 7) at the Meta facility in County Meath.

Connect said it has instead decided to refer the dispute to the Labour Court.

Workers were due to strike over changes to worker shift patterns in the wake of redundancies. Meta is looking to move workers from a six-week shift cycle to a new four-week shift cycle, which will see its members working more weekends and night shifts.

After voting in favor to strike, Connect said some workers were told by Meta that staff could be outsourced.

Meta last week denied the union-busting attempts in a comment to DCD, and added that it does not engage directly with trade unions but has been “consulting directly with these employees over the past six months to discuss the change and agree ways in which their existing highly competitive compensation and benefits package would be adjusted to reflect the change.”

The case is going to court under Section 20 of the Industrial Relations Act 1990, the outcome of which is binding on the union.

Connect assistant general secretary, Brian Nolan, said: “Over the past 48 hours we have been inundated with correspondence and calls from various contractors, union members, politicians, and media outlets in relation to the industrial action scheduled to commence tomorrow. Some of those contacting us have been misinformed about the dispute, being told that it concerns ‘union recognition’.

“We must be clear, this dispute concerns the failure of Meta to engage under the auspices of the Irish State’s industrial relations machinery to resolve matters of great concern to our members, namely a unilateral change to their terms and conditions of employment."

Anne O’Leary, head of Meta in Ireland, was also recently appointed as IBEC President. The union has said the position of O’Leary at the head of the Irish business lobbying group will be untenable if the company refuses to engage with the state's industrial relations mechanisms.