Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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To follow on from Deputy Paul Murphy's question on content moderators, my understanding is that if they have not made contact with the Minister they will do so. It is very welcome that this meeting can be set up. I would not agree with the Minister on the issue of them working from home. They should be given the choice to be at home. The problem a lot of them have is that they are under a confidentiality clause and they are not allowed to say where they work. That would make working at home particularly difficult if they had to try to explain to the people they were living with what they were doing. That in itself is a huge problem so I very much welcome the fact that there will be a meeting.

This is a new form of work. I am going back to my trade union days to try to find an analogous grade or a comparator and the only one I could come up with would be members of An Garda Síochána who would be detailed with investigating incidents of child pornography. By virtue of their job, they would have to view similar images but I am also aware that content moderators do not only view offensive and horrible imagery but that there is also other work involved. That would be the only comparator so I would encourage the Minister to look at the terms and conditions those people have in terms of their mental health and well-being, as a part of the work that is already done.

I know that is not what we are here to discuss but given that it was raised, I wanted to address it.

The Tánaiste talked about a person who may have been told by his or her boss that he or she has to go into work, where he or she might have been told previously that he or she did not. All the data suggest that more people are now going into work and one does not have to be a genius to figure out why that is. They are being told to go into work because some bosses do not think that people working at home can be productive, although we know that productivity has increased. When the Tánaiste stated that those people can go to the WRC, I point out, with respect, that people must wait a long time to get a hearing at the commission. The hope is - let us all cross our fingers - that we will not be in this pandemic forever, or certainly for much longer. While we are, however, there is an urgency around this.

Every night we hear the figures and see the Tánaiste, the Taoiseach and members of the Opposition telling people to stay at home but these people are being told they cannot. They are putting themselves, their families and everyone else at risk, and we know that the virus moves only when people move. There is a case to be made for increasing the funding to the WRC, whether to bring back persons with an expertise who have retired or people who would be able to hit the ground running by not needing to skill up and could provide that service now. Otherwise, it will be too late for all those people. If I was told by my boss that I had to go in to work, even though I thought could work from home, and I made a complaint to the WRC, it could be a year before that complaint is heard, by which stage, fingers crossed, the pandemic will have finished, but that person will still have to go in to and out of work. Is there a possibility that additional resources to the WRC could be deployed quickly for the temporary or short-time deployment of staff to deal with cases of this nature, and specifically people who are told they have to go to work, even when they think they should have a right not to?