Mr. Pablo Rojas Coppari:

In the current format our employment permit system has a list of categories which are not eligible for employment permits. Many of those categories represent essential skills, particularly around restaurant work, care work, work in private homes, certain positions in the retail and agriculture sectors, etc. There are generally the sectors in which workers are more vulnerable. They are not regulated and migrant workers are more concentrated in them.

In the current format of the Bill, there is a provision for the job categories to be looked at and reviewed in respect of labour growth outcomes and prospects for the market. Unfortunately, current projections we have on how the work permit system will recruit foreign workers is solely focused on highly skilled work. The reality is that there is an increased shortage of labour in essential skills sectors. The lack of supply of workers for those sectors ends up with systems of exploitation such as the au pair system we described earlier. We have been researching a little more how the international student system is being used as a source of cheap labour. Members will be very much aware of the crisis in international language schools. Essential skills vacancies are being filled by people who do not have legal status as workers, as they are students or come under other immigration categories. To afford workers the greatest rights, we need to re-examine the ineligible job categories and allow people to come to work in Ireland through a pathway that allows permanency and rights.