Ms Maeve McElwee:

Part of what we hope to bring into the framework is to give employers opportunities to open doors and see that this is not something they should be overly concerned about and that they should be able to sit down with people, given that they are the employers’ workers, and have that conversation. It is an opportunity to explore whether the relationship can be built further, which is an important first step. We do not want to throw out all of our industrial relations system in one go – that would be chaotic and challenging – but this gives us an opportunity. We have included provisions in our recommendations about building. We are promoting those with our employer base. IBEC has always said it is important to have a strong social partner at tripartite level with whom we can engage.

Anecdotally, after briefing employers on the recommendations in the high-level working group report, employers told us they were in collective bargaining environments and that they had union recognition but that they could not get enough people to join the union to ensure it provided a sufficient level of representation. There are different perspectives to this story. If it is the case that many people are pushing hard to be unionised, we would see more people taking up individual union membership to promote that. I am not saying the numbers are not there, but we are not seeing that activity. From our perspective, there is a place for accepted bodies and direct engagement, and there is absolutely a place for collective bargaining. We are trying to help employers who are open to the conversation to open the door and get it happening. As Ms Patricia King told me, it is for the union to come to that space and try to agree a middle ground with employers that affords everyone the space to work collectively and positively.