Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to try to be constructive but I cannot be constructive without first noticing how badly the Minister of State has read the Sinn Féin Bill. I will give one example. From his own written notice here, he quotes from the Sinn Féin Bill and says these notices will have to be in English, Irish and in other languages, as required, when the Bill actually states, and I quote, "the roster may be in English and Irish, and in other languages where required". If the Minister of State cannot even read the Bill properly he is not in a good position to come in here and tell us about how important the details are. It is a complete misreading of the Bill. I will try and be constructive because it is embarrassing for the Minister of State to have put that in writing.

I want to deal with the Minister of State's proposals and I wish to clarify three or four points. The first is can the Minister of State clarify whether this Bill will exclusively prohibit zero hours working and if there are exceptions, what exceptions will these be? The second point relates to casual work because he references casual work in his heads of Bill. My concern is that the term "casual work" can be used, as it currently is, to effectively stop workers from being protected. I wonder has the Minister of State a definition of the term "casual work" and if so, could he share it with us? Would he accept the importance, if he does not have a definition, that it must be very tightly defined? Finally, the Minister of State did not explain in his last answer why it is better to have four bands rather than seven, particularly when the first band is worthless. The band between one and 10 hours does nothing for any worker. I am puzzled because, as the Chairman will confirm, we have had opinions from all parties, left, right and middle, and no one had an issue with the bands in Deputy Cullinane's Bill. Will the Minister of State clarify if he indicated that ICTU was asking for four bands? I can tell him from speaking to ICTU that is not my understanding.