The judge is biased by social media?

It wasn't a court case so they're were no judges, per se. The WRC is a state agency who presides over industrial relations.

More likely that the offense by twatter was more egregious than what the courts are used to.

Ah yes, an objective comment by a rational author.

If it's an illegally biased opinion then presumably it will be overturned on appeal. Otherwise Irish law looks prohibitively business-unfriendly.

So business-unfriendly the tax loophole used to be called the Irish double sandwich.

“Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich” is the name!

Ah right thanks, must be getting old.

They have to pay compensation based on salary and tenure time. Most likely the salary in this case was higher than an average Irish salary. Moreover firing without warning tends to increase the severance benefits even more, which is also why it is relatively rare.