Mr. Dermot Mulligan:

I think the Senator is right in that there has been a great deal of remote working during the pandemic in the past two years. Even as we come out of the pandemic, we are seeing that rather than returning to five days a week in the office, hybrid working is much more popular. This means, perhaps, a number of days in the office and a number not. Still, probably some people are working 100% remotely.

The aim of this legislation is provide a legal framework so that employees have a right to request this. As in all things, the occurrence of remote working can be uneven. There are some sectors, as the Senator said, where there is an awful lot of it going on and it is very common. In fact, to some extent, in some sectors, probably employers will have to offer either significant hybrid working or remote working in order to attract employees and the skills that they need. That will be a reality in certain occupations and certain sectors of the marketplace.

There are other sectors where, perhaps, remote working is something that has not been happening as much as it might and employers need to consider it more. This legislation aims to give the employee the right to request of those employers that they seriously consider this. That is the change and difference. It also puts in place a legal framework to allow those conversations to take place.

We would be very conscious of the impact in rural and regional areas, as the Senator said, and hub development is part of that. Some €9 million was announced last summer to try to continue to enhance hubs in regional and rural areas.

There was a question earlier about Enterprise Ireland, EI, and the Industry Development Authority, IDA, and whether they are promoting this. They most certainly are. In particular, in relation to IDA, remote working is a key part of being able to supply businesses with the skills that they need in a tightening labour market in certain sectors. Therefore, it is very much part of our enterprise policy and our enterprise agencies' activities, both EI and IDA. We see this as part of the future and so we need to put a legal framework in place to make sure that there is a floor of protection, it occurs in a structured way and the employers that have not thought about it perhaps think about it more deeply whenever they get the request from the employee.