Mr. Vincent Jennings:

I welcome the opportunity afforded by the committee to the CSNA to present on this Private Members' Bill. The CSNA is not anti-employee or anti-trade union. It has never supported any political party and it recognises the efforts made by the drafters of this Bill to address what they perceive to be a particular problem with regard to the difficulties encountered by some workers in securing less precarious contracts. Our written submissions set out our response to the five specific matters for consideration that the committee requested. I do not intend to reintroduce these matters but I will obviously cover any of the queries that either the Chairman or the members may have.

We take the attitude that every Bill, whether Government sponsored or a Private Members' Bill, should be accompanied by a regulatory impact assessment, RIA, in keeping with better Government principles, as adopted over a decade ago. Such an assessment would analyse the cost implications for businesses, particularly small businesses, and consider alternatives to legislative intervention. It would also examine the size and scale of the problem, something that the University of Limerick study was lamentably shy on discovering. An RIA would also seek to meet all relevant stakeholders in advance of progressing toward a Bill. We understand that this Bill has not had the benefit of employer consultation. The CSNA does not believe that the committee's pre-legislative scrutiny is the correct approach for devising coherent and competent legislation, as it is dealing with a published Bill rather than being involved in creating the legislation. The CSNA does not accept that additional legislation, which by extension places additional regulatory burdens on an entire cohort of employers, is an appropriate or necessary response in the absence of evidence that would quantify a problem that could only be resolved by the introduction of new laws.

The Bill is one-sided in its direction and suffers from a lack of appreciation of the employers' perspective. It seeks to increase the rights of workers by way of increasing obligations on employers without any provision to offset them if and when their businesses require urgent attention. It does not make provision for how anomalies and unforeseen consequences that would follow from it, if enacted, would be addressed. A worker returning from maternity or extended sick leave would quite legitimately expect to be able to return to the position she had held prior to her absence. How would these returns be accounted for if the workers who had filled their hours had demanded their new banded hours contract replace the hours they had worked?

Many of our members employ workers in the evening, at weekends and on public holidays. The Bill makes a crude reference to hours worked without considering the nature of these hours. If a worker seeks an entitlement to receive a new contract based on hours worked in the preceding six months, there will be no restriction or obligation to restrict such hours to similar periods, as previously worked. It has the potential to restrict flexibility.

The business model our members adopt requires very significant elements of flexibility to meet an ever-changing retail environment. Convenience retailing extends across a substantial portion of the day, from as early as 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., at a minimum, seven days per week. There are, within each week, significant peaks and troughs. Local events can and do create the need for extra or fewer hours. These events are not predictable, nor are they constant. Granting an employee the right to be employed based on previous hours worked displays a lack of understanding of our businesses and the ever-changing nature of this most challenging environment.

Banded hours are most certainly one of the ways some employers can regulate their businesses. They cannot be applied by all employers who, by virtue of the size or nature of their business, need a greater degree of flexibility, whether for seasonal, structural or financial considerations.

The CSNA is very conscious that the Bill, if enacted, will create the potential for substantial additional costs for our members if they are involved in interaction with the Workplace Relations Commission and the Labour Court. These costs are not limited to the cost of engaging legal counsel. There are also costs associated with responding to the commission, attending the adjudication hearing and the Labour Court. There are additional costs involved in the provision of easily read notices in an unspecified number of languages. These have to be accessed, approved and completed, at a cost to every employer in the State. We consider such obligations to be unnecessary and disproportionate.