Mr. Gerry Light:

It is always important to identify areas of common interest and agreement. If we are serious about rebuilding the retail sector, if we can identify agreement and a commitment to that from early on, that is vitally important. It is very welcome to hear Mr. Graham talk about seeing the dark and the despair that has come out of Covid-19 as an opportunity to look at the retail sector and reinvent it in many ways.

I have long held the view, in my capacity as a trade union official for many years, that the retail sector has been treated as some kind of a Cinderella sector, insofar as the supports and the commitments that it has been given from a wide range of different Governments over the years. In comparison with other sectors such as manufacturing industry and so on, there is nobody looking to bail out retailers, whether a store that employs 300 to 400 workers, or one of the smaller stores Mr. Graham talked about. I pushed this with the Tánaiste before I became a member of that retail forum group. I have to say, in fairness, I believe there is widespread support for the notion of looking at the sector and understanding the challenges, in particular the challenges facing traditional bricks and mortar retail, and working together to try to rebuild a sustainable sector, built on new values and new standards. After all, what is good for the retail sector and what is good for the businesses within is good for workers and, as Mr. Graham said, for society generally, namely, the small towns and shopping centres and all the other aspects that need to be considered. They are all the key aspects.

We need to be serious about this. There is no point paying it lip service and then when it comes to the first initiative that seeks to increase or enhance workers' rights or participation, or to give them the best possible living standards and terms and conditions, saying that it is only feasible in accordance with what the business is able to pay. There is no point in us getting the standard response we have been getting down through the years. I spent five and a half years on the Low Pay Commission and I heard many submissions. The automatic response for many employers is that putting a cent onto the wage rate will cost jobs and will be damaging to the sector or to the relevant sectors they represent. However, the truth is that all the independent research that has been done through the years for the Low Pay Commission has debunked those scaremongering predictions. I do not believe that would be the case if we worked in unison and in respect to try to drive the sector into a better place. I do not think it is an issue of whether businesses can afford to pay decent wages and have decent terms and conditions but I think it is an issue of whether the market can afford it. We all know that the market is consumer-led.

I could debate, not in a very aggressive or adversarial way, the whole notion of where we are going to end up eventually with the online development. There was a rush to online during the first lockdown but during the second lockdown what we saw was a 1% difference in the months between June and October, a 1% increase when people could get back out and physically do their shopping again. We have also seen considerable bounce-back in some business across retail with the move back. Of course, we have heard the debate about the retained personal savings and that when the opportunity arises, there will be a real willingness to go out and spend that money.

While you could not ignore the impact of online shopping going forward, I do not think it is going to be the phenomenon people predict it will be. That is something we need to look at in terms of an overall view of the sector.

It is important if we are serious and committed to looking at his from everybody's perspective. From our perspective, we will do our utmost to ensure that the voice of workers is very loudly and strongly heard. If you make that commitment, one thing that the trade union movement will do, regardless of who you are, whether it be Government or employers, we will hold you to that commitment, and we will test you on that commitment every step of the way. That is what we are obliged to do.

There is a range of things that Mr. Doyle touched on in the submission that need to be done.