Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The Taoiseach makes it sound as if Irish Ferries have nothing to do with this, as if the company was from Honolulu. Irish Ferries are as Irish as Croagh Patrick. The company may have found a way of distancing itself from Irish law, especially Irish employment law. However, it is the privatised successor of the old B&I ferry company. There have been stories in recent months about the ownership of the company and the Irish players who were involved in it. By any standards, €4 per hour is not an acceptable rate of pay. The company is in clear breach of the national minimum wage and the Taoiseach rightly stated that anybody paying under that wage is acting illegally. It would appear that this company has found a way to circumvent Irish employment law in order to pay these workers €4 per hour.

It is the responsibility of the Government to enact whatever legislation and regulation is required to ensure that this does not happen. Some of the legislation, which the trade unions complain has not been implemented, relates to this area. This includes the enforcement of employment regulations and employment law, as well as the protection of the rights of agency workers. The Taoiseach should ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment to give a bit of urgency to this. I do not think that anybody in this country finds it acceptable that workers who are sailing ships in and out of this country every second day should be paid wages of this kind.

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