Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will pass the Chairman's comments on to InterTradeIreland and the others. On the living wage, we have asked the Low Pay Commission to do research on this and advise us. The Chairman rightly pointed out that a group has pointed out what it believes the living wage should be in Ireland but any group can establish itself and come up what it thinks a living wage should be. The appropriate body to do that is the Low Pay Commission. It is a statutory tripartite body involving unions, employers and experts and they calculate the national minimum wage. I imagine it will be the body we ask to calculate the living wage when we are able to introduce it.

The research will look at three areas: how a living wage should be calculated, who it should apply to and how we would phase it in. It is intended that it would be higher than the existing national minimum wage. There are different ways that it can be calculated. Some calculate it by the minimal essential standard of living, MESL, and that it is all about what is put in the basket. There is the question of what is considered minimum and essential and what is not. That is complicated but it might well be the right approach. The other way, which is much simpler, is to have it as a percentage of the median wage. It could be 55%, 60% or 65% of the median wage. None of that is decided yet. The purpose of the research is for the Low Pay Commission to study all that and present the Government with a recommendation or options.