Arthur Morgan (Louth, Sinn Fein)

Is the Minister of State considering introducing legislation to hold the first contractor responsible for ensuring all labour legislation is adhered to? With 31 inspectors to a workforce of 2.07 million people, each inspector is responsible for 66,775 workers. It is a vast number and those inspectors now have an additional legislative burden. Does the Minister of State consider that the additional legislative burden the inspectorate has to handle has been matched by additional numbers of inspectors? It certainly does not appear to have been.

Media reports in the past week have suggested the Minister of State may be on the verge of making proposals concerning the labour inspectorate. Could he tell the House what plans he has in this regard?

In early 2005, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment circulated to the social partners a report entitled Mandate and Resourcing of the Labour Inspectorate. Will the Minister of State tell us what the shortcomings were in the current set up, and whether they were identified in that report?

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