Mr. Gerry McCormack:

I thank everybody for having us here today. Deputy Paul Murphy made his point very well. At present, we have issues with legal people coming into the Labour Court and creating all sorts of havoc with joint labour committees in particular and we certainly do not want that to happen. We are very comfortable in the Labour Court. We are very comfortable with the Workplace Relations Commission and know it very well; much better than the legal people. Legislation that is strong and solid is needed as it would ensure there are no problems no matter who is on the other side of the fence because we would be more than capable of dealing with it.

The committee needs to understand that this directive does not just concern national legislation. It affects tens of thousands of European workers because once enacted in Ireland, the directive affects those people who work in all of the companies across Europe. Ireland, because it has defective legislation is also taking the rights of workers from a swathe of European workers. Please bear in mind that this directive is not just a domestic issue.

Simply, we need to correct defective legislation. Therefore, we need legislation that will allow the WRC and the Labour Court to issue a recommendation, and a binding determination if there is no resolution. Once we have that, then we will have a good mechanism. It is not about a model for Europe as to be honest, I am not interested in creating a model for any other country. Our only interest is to make sure that workers' rights are fully respected. This legislation is very useful to workers but all it does is give information and consultation. As it omits collective bargaining, there should be no fear from anybody and no fear from the Government. The Government has let us down badly as it had an opportunity to fix this matter. We have tried to improve things for a number of years and now the Government needs to sort out this matter as quickly as possible.