Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 13:

In page 16, line 25, after "not" to insert "blacklist,".

The Minister of State will be aware of blacklisting, which reared its ugly head in Great Britain recently. This practice involves a systematic surveillance of trade unionists who are simply active within the legal parameters of that country. They have been targeted and victimised by employers and companies which are employed simply to identify who the trade unionists are and give their details to employers to make sure they are not employed. If a subcontractor is working in a particular area and one of these trade unionists is involved, the subcontractor is not to be employed. It is incredible how organised and commercial its development in Great Britain has been. It has led to disasters for people. It has led to unemployment, violence and horrific hardship for families and communities.

The Minister of State might feel that we have not had many examples of it here but we know that some of the companies that have been named and shamed in Great Britain operate in Ireland and have previously won State contracts. Examples include Balfour Beatty, BAM and Carillion. Over 30 of these companies work in the State at the moment. My worry is that if we do not tackle this and use an opportunity to prevent it happening, friends and family who are trade unionists and are simply seeking to ensure that workers have decent pay and conditions could be blacklisted and prevented from taking up decent work in the future. This section relates to the prohibition on penalisation of a worker by an employer. The section deals with many different issues so this is why I would like to include blacklisting in it.

Amendment No. 14 relates to the same issue, trade unions and trade union activity. I do not fully understand amendment No. 17. In respect of amendment No. 18, the Minister of State has obviously included intimidation and coercion in this section. Intimidation and coercion are, obviously, worthy issues to focus on but I would include harassment because it can be a more low-level, insidious and difficult issue with which a worker must deal. I was going to include haranguing but that might mean that politicians would be able to use that as a defence in future.