Mr. S?amus Dooley:

I have been a trade union official for 25 years, and 20 years dealing with RTÉ. One of the first things I was involved in with RTÉ was the Goodbody process, which has not been mentioned in any committee. That was when RTÉ, under pressure from the trade union group, regularised bogus self-employment. Having done that, I remember touring the country with former trade union group secretary, Dónall Ó Braonáin, and sitting down with people to examine their new contracts of employment. The same bad practice was slowly introduced again by stealth. In 2008 and 2009, the group of unions began a campaign to stop that practice again. The issue of bogus self-employment has come up again and again, and it is something we have resisted.

Reference has been made to the employment status group and the guidelines for employment. What is interesting is that was introduced in 2001, directly as part of the negotiations with congress under the Programme for Prosperity and Fairness. One of the things that informed those negotiations was the experience in RTÉ. However, the reality is that the trade union group has been crying in the wilderness in these Houses for action on bogus self-employment for a long time.