Mr. John Horan:

We would be very conscious of the idea of proportionality and what a large company with a human resources department might be expected to do and what a smaller employer, a one-man, two-man or family operation, might be expected to and we apply our common sense to that. If people are breaking the law we cannot ignore that but we allow for an element of variation between what would be expected of a very major employer and of someone with fewer resources.

To elaborate slightly, that is the benefit of having lay people on the tribunal. They bring the benefit of experience and therefore we can take into account, to some extent, the fact that a small employer may not be as sophisticated, may not have a human resources department and so on. We do that. On the other hand, it is a civil right, and a human right, and one cannot abrogate those rights simply because somebody is employed by a small employer. People either have rights or they do not have rights but within that we do take it on board.

On Senator Quinn's point, I am very conscious of that case because in my previous employment I dealt with that question a good deal. That question revolved around the issue of permits. If somebody did not have their work permit renewed by their employer - the law puts the onus on the employer - as happened in that man's case, through no fault of his own the employee is working outside the permit system. In that case the High Court held that his contract was not legal or valid. The contract could not be enforced because he was employed illegally through no fault of his own. That is an horrendous thing to happen and it was entirely foreseeable. In my previous job we had discussions with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and the Department of Justice and Equality to the effect that that was a case waiting to happen. The migrant rights association argued the point trenchantly that people here who fall outside the permit system become illegal and essentially have no rights. That poor man was treated very badly, and he still has not had his rights vindicated. There is an argument about changing the rules on permits to say that, notwithstanding that somebody should have a permit and so on, the basic protections in law should be afforded to that person. That should happen.