Mr. Tom Hayes:

No matter what we do, we will end up in the Labour Court. As Irish legislation in general stands, there are no provisions for costs to be awarded in the Labour Court. However, there is a way of resolving this dispute and that is by way of the agreements between EWCs and central management. In most of the agreements that myself and Mr. Sheridan have been involved with we make provision for expert assistance to an EWC. As I mentioned earlier, we are particularly concerned that the experts should be real experts who can genuinely assist an EWC in fulfilling its mandate. Central management provide financial resources to the EWCs to allow for the use of experts. Most of the companies I work with here in Ireland would have no difficulty whatever were some body such as SIPTU providing those resources and acting as experts to EWCs, helping them to take issues to the Labour Court or to the WRC should those disputes arise. Should SIPTU be paid for that? Certainly. Do I want to see barristers on both sides in industrial relations disputes? No, I do not. That is not helpful.