Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with the sentiment that we should ensure that people who get State support are compliant. We propose there will be a procedures manual for the local enterprise offices. We are currently working on that and a requirement of compliance with labour law will be included in that review. We will examine exactly what the Deputy has set out. We must strike a balance. Some of these are very small micro start-ups. We do not want to set up excessively onerous compliance statements. We need to use judgment here. Clearly, our intention is that compliance with tax, labour and basic environmental law and all of those areas will be requirements. We need to examine what nature of compliance presentation we would expect.

The Deputy's amendment provides that companies would be compliant with Labour Court judgments. We have a voluntary system of industrial relations. I would not envisage getting involved in industrial relations and mixing industrial relations into this area. That would not be the right approach to take. On the issue of compliance with Labour Court judgments, both sides can put forward reasons where people are in dispute or are unhappy with a Labour Court judgment and we try to deal with those issues but we do so within the tradition that we have in place. Therefore, I do not think the inclusion of that area is appropriate here. However, on the main thrust of what the Deputy has said, namely, that we should ensure that clients of our local enterprise offices are compliant across the law, that is certainly something we will seek to build into the procedures manual and to have a way of certifying that.