Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Sorry, just on this, the main reason was that the company did not have to. This was made clear to the people on the trade union side. There was absolutely no requirement on the company to engage at the WRC, despite the fact there was quite decent density among the workers and it was clearly the will of the workers to engage at the WRC. Notwithstanding the individual circumstances, there are times when unions and employers do not agree; of course they do not. The employer thinks it has a very good reason not to agree and equally so does the union, but they take it to the Labour Court or the WRC and thrash it out. We are discussing employers who do not do so. I cannot envisage an industrial dispute, such as there was in this case, that would not be appropriate to bring to the third-party machinery. Taking all of this into consideration, I am asking whether, in general, the witnesses believe it is unacceptable for those employers in receipt of large and very lucrative State contracts to deal with the State for those contracts and to refuse to deal with the State through the Labour Court and other third-party mechanisms.