Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Chair and all the members of the committee secretariat for the work that has gone into the session today. I particularly thank our witnesses. I want to say a particular word of thanks to Ms Mulholland because she has outlined in very stark detail the picture of a woman that I could nearly relate to myself. We were all nodding along in recognition of the obstacles around people getting to things. The outline was very welcome because it is very real. The one takeaway is that this is very real. As I am sure she will not mind me saying, the Chair and I are both former trade union organisers. We have experienced this from the other side and have seen the impact it has had. We have seen women in their workplace fade away because they do not speak up and they do not want to answer questions about what they were doing at the weekend or talk about why they were off work yesterday. They do not want to look into the faces of their colleagues who are cross because they have taken another day off without any notice and all of that kind of thing. I have seen that and I know the Chair has seen it. As public representatives, we probably have all seen in it our clinics as well. To nearly put a face on it, Ms Mulholland's contribution was very valuable and useful. It stopped us all in our tracks a little so I thank her particularly and I thank all our witnesses.

My first questions are for Ms Benson and Ms Mernagh and are on this legislation. I am one of its sponsors. It is an amendment to the Organisation of Working Time Act because I regard it as a workers' rights issue that should be part of the workplace leave and part of the normal way that a workplace functions. Does Ms Benson think there is a benefit in treating this form of leave as part of a suite of leave to which a person is entitled under the Organisation of Working Time Act, rather than adding the legislation to a work-life balance Bill or other legislation? For me, it is firmly situated as a workplace issue and a workers' rights issue but I would welcome the views of anyone in this regard, albeit those of Ms Benson and Ms Mernagh in the first instance.