Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I thank all our contributors for their contributions so far. I do not have many questions on animation. Our job is to assess whether section 481 is delivering what it is supposed to deliver. From what I see of the animation industry, it is. They are companies, full-time jobs and industry development. The industry is supposed to be developing and growing and creating companies of scale and career opportunities. That is not to say it is perfect, because I have heard a few stories about particular companies, but it is obvious that there are jobs and an industry. My questions, therefore, are directed at the live-action sector, where I do not see the jobs. The credit is supposed to be strictly dependent on creating jobs. You either create quality employment and training or you do not, and you either contribute to culture or you do not. In fact, the European rules on this are very clear. You should not get state aid if you are not doing these things.

I want the film industry to get state aid but do not understand the contrast. I do not understand how the animation sector can create jobs and companies of scale and how theatres such as the Abbey, Gate and Project can create jobs and careers when given public money while the live-action sector does not. To put it bluntly, the testimony we heard last week from the Irish Film Workers’ Association was that every time a production ends, the clock goes back to zero from the point of view of the employee. In other words, an employee who has worked for successive designated activity companies, DACs, does not have an employer because that employer was his or her last DAC, which is now gone. Therefore, an employee starts from scratch. Even if he or she has worked for 20 DACs over 25 years, he or she effectively starts from scratch, meaning no recognition whatsoever of his or her service in the industry. There is no comeback if, for example, employees are blacklisted, as they say they are. Many of those who raised concerns about the industry with members of this committee in 2018 have not worked in the industry since.

Some of the witnesses present know that they have not worked in the industry again even though they were never formally dismissed and there was no process through which they were dismissed. They just do not get to work again. I am not here to advocate on individual cases, but I see nothing in how the industry is structured to prevent that from happening. How does the industry prevent it?

I am confused by the Screen Guilds of Ireland. I understand it is a private limited company with a CEO and it says that it represents 2,500 workers. According to the Department's analysis, we only have 2,500 people in the industry and, unlike in animation, only a few of them have full-time jobs, so it is not clear to me how the Screen Guilds of Ireland can represent people when they do not have jobs and it is a private company that I understand is wholly funded by Screen Ireland. I am confused about that. Who, then, does SIPTU represent? There is also the Irish Film Workers Association, although there are not many film workers left in the industry because they do not get jobs anymore. I do not understand how this works. Are people right in saying that the clock goes back to zero each time? Will the witnesses explain the process involved in someone getting a job on an Irish film? Who does the person go to? Who decides whether he or she gets employed?

Members of Screen Producers Ireland, SPI, get section 481 relief under the explicit requirement that it creates quality employment and training, yet Ms Elaine Geraghty, SPI's former chairperson, told the Labour Court:

I will give further evidence before the Court that there is no possible basis, having due regard to the realities of the sector, on which a relationship of employment can be said to have existed between the parties hereto. This is on the basis of the clearly established industry norms and practices governing working arrangements in this sector, including the operation of Section 481 Relief.

There were similar testimonies from representatives of some of the large recipients of section 481 relief. The people who are getting this relief are saying that they have no employees and could not possibly have any, yet they are explicitly given the relief on the basis that they are creating quality employment and training. This is a contradiction and I would like it explained.