Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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I move amendment No. 18:

In page 37, between lines 22 and 23, to insert the following: “(2) The Minister shall refuse to grant an employment permit where in the 3 years preceding the day on which the application was made the person or employer who has made the offer of employment has been found in breach of equality and employment-related legislation.”.

Amendments Nos. 18 and 19 relate to not allowing employers that have been in found in breach of equality and employment-related legislation to apply again for an employment permit for a period of three years. It also relates to the use of board and accommodation as remuneration. We have all seen the fairly high-profile dismissals, sackings and lay-offs that are happening in companies where when you would talk to the workers previously they would tell you there is a pizza bar or an omelette station or something. I am always minded of the words of my granny, “If you work for food, you will never be idle.”

Amendment No. 18 is designed to ensure that an employment permit cannot be issued to an employer or a person who has been found in breach of equality and employment-related legislation in the three years preceding the day on which the permit application was made. Again, we are discussing at length workers who are vulnerable. If we are genuine about wanting to protect them, there should be a real deterrent to employers that breach the employment legislation and equality legislation. We have talked about the good work that the WRC does and it has recovered more than €1.6 million in stolen wages. By virtue of that, we know that all employers are saints. While nobody is suggesting that all employers are dying to get these permits in order that they can exploit workers, we need to put in as many safeguards here as we possibly can.

Again, on amendment No. 19, I have submitted this amendment to discuss the use of board and accommodation as payment. I am specifically looking for assurances that where board and accommodation are used as payment, it will be realistically benchmarked if it is a necessary part of the wages, although I fail to see why it would be necessary. In the event that it happens, there has to be a realistic benchmark. Someone cannot be docked €1,200 or €1,300 a month for shared accommodation in a mobile home halfway up the side of a mountain.

I am looking for an assurance from the Minister of State that the provision of board and accommodation will be overseen to ensure that where it is included as part of a package, the monetary value placed on it is reflective of the real value of board and accommodation and to confirm that if he cannot facilitate such oversight, then it cannot be part of it. If there is nobody checking on it, then the Minister of State knows himself. We are not talking about the vast majority, we are talking about a small few but even if it is one, it is enough.

Not recently, but when I was working in the union, I saw conditions where people were living. I will not even say what one would not put living in it. The Minister of State knows what I am talking about. Those people were getting docked out of their wages for living in appalling circumstances. Nobody expects canteen-style food but there was no nutrition in the food that they were getting. It was muck. That already exists. It is not all employers; it is a very small number of employers. However, even if it one, we should be trying to ensure that we limit the circumstances where food and lodging is regarded as part of the wages and that it is overseen in order that people on very low wages are not getting money docked from their wages to facilitate what is substandard board and substandard accommodation.