Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)

I too am delighted to speak on the Bill. I congratulate the Minister who, in fairness to him, has been very proactive since assuming this portfolio. He is interested and passionate about getting to the bottom of the problems that are diminishing job numbers on a daily or weekly basis. While we may get lost in many of the Bill's technical issues, I want to speak as a small employer who understands many of the issues involved. Next month, I will have been in business for 30 years. I currently employ eight people, but I have often employed up to 12 or 15. While they are not huge numbers by any means, those sort of small businesses have built our economy, yet they have received no State supports by way of huge grants from the IDA, Enterprise Ireland or county enterprise boards. I never received any grants, nor did I look for them. I may have sought one or two employment grants, but never succeeded in getting them. There are many people throughout the country who have had the same experience.

It is a delicate job for the Minister and his Department to protect vulnerable workers while allowing flexibility for businesses to remain in place. The last speaker, Deputy Tóibín from Meath, said that many issues were wrong, including low wages. In his own constituency, Spicers is shedding jobs because of competition. The vast majority of companies, especially smaller businesses that have grown larger, have had a great relationship with their workers over the years. Some of them did not have unions and did not need them because they were fair. In turn, their employees worked hard for the company, as well as for themselves and their families. That happened in many communities but in the past 40 years, up to 2004 or 2005, legislation was brought in to protect workers and rightly so for much of it, but unfortunately we never seemed to repeal the old legislation.

When I was first elected to the Dáil, I was lobbied continuously, and still am - I am sure the Minister is also lobbied - about all the EROs, JLOs and little empires that were set up, including NERA, the National Employment Rights Authority. They were established from the perspective of being necessary and having the required modus operandi, including good operations and vision, but they got carried away. It became more cumbersome, awkward and difficult for employers to maintain their workforces, as well as making plans to develop in future. Employers had to deal with such a plethora of agencies, rules and regulations that they would have had to be legally qualified to understand and assess them. If an employer had five employees, he or she needed a secretary specifically to deal with all the book-keeping and other paperwork, not to mention all the inspectors that were arriving. To cap it all, we got NERA.

I ran a long campaign to have NERA stood down. It should have been changed from the National Employment Rights Authority to being a national employers support agency. I certainly saw this coming, as most people did. There was no help for employers who got caught up in industrial relations issues. Once greed set in, we lost sight of honest men and women who wanted to work and provide for their families by contributing to the company and the community. Not only did it set in with some greedy employers who wanted to drive down wages to make more profits, but SIPTU and many other unions also had a role to play in this. They lobbied and all got cosy under the various schemes that were brought in by previous governments to enhance industrial peace. We got industrial peace, thankfully, but at what cost to the economy? What good is it now having a plethora of quangos that we cannot get rid of? We cannot get rid of them because they are too embedded in legislation and cannot be touched. The Construction Industry Federation and many other agencies were involved around the one table, but they forgot where the crumbs were falling. They also forgot where their meals were coming from because they killed the goose that laid the golden egg. They went over the top completely and now we are trying to pick up the pieces.

Having just come from a meeting with the troika, I have learned a lot in the past two hours. I am glad the Technical Group has had an opportunity to meet the troika for a first meeting. The troika may be blamed for everything, but it should not be blamed for half of it because it had to come in here. The troika did not come here soon enough; it should have been here two years earlier. Now that the troika is here, however, it is a convenient scapegoat for everyone to blame.

I challenge the Jack O'Connors and other union leaders to come to the table and be honest about ordinary workers and lower paid people. I am meeting self-employed people daily, as well as workers and - worst of all - people with no jobs. I compliment the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Burton, on indicating recently that she will consider giving something to self-employed people under the PRSI scheme when they cease business. When their jobs are gone, their families face a human tragedy because they cannot get a shilling. Is that fair? Who is speaking for them? Where is the Construction Industry Federation or the small business association? They are not there. They are able to negotiate all these rates and other issues they want to apply, but they got carried away completely. We had a government, of which I was a member, which was too willing to give them everything, no matter what. They wanted to buy industrial peace at whatever cost. That is why the Croke Park agreement cannot and will not deliver. It is not delivering, it will not deliver and cannot do so. I cannot see why the troika is not looking at that because it is nonsense. I will not say what the troika representatives said this evening because they asked us to be respectful until they leave on Thursday. Nonetheless, anyone undertaking a peripheral examination would know that there is a lot wrong in this system and it is not all about employers.

The Vita Cortex dispute was mentioned in Cork. I can say that the Ronan family were damn good employers in south Tipperary for decades. When NAMA was set up, I said it was like a wild animal in the woods and no one knew where it would end up. By hell, do we know now where it is ending up? We might have banned stag hunting, but we will have to bring in some sort of hunting for these NAMA officials and the racket that is going on in there. No one knows where it will end up, yet millions of euro due to small and medium-sized businesses are now tied up in NAMA for one reason or another. It is no good to this State or employers and it is worse for employees. What is happening down there is a scandal, yet their money is tied up. I wanted to say that although I might be attacked for doing so. The Ronan family gave exemplary employment to hundreds of people in south Tipperary. It was all fine and dandy while Vita Cortex and other companies were going well, but not now because of the money that is tied up in NAMA. I am not defending Jack Ronan in this instance, although I know many members of the family. There is more going on under the surface in all these cases than what is seen.

We can have all the attacks from our Sinn Féin colleagues on this, but Deputy Tóibín could see for himself at first hand when he asked the Minister to intervene. I support him on that because people should go in. That is why I said that NERA, the National Employment Rights Authority, should be changed to the national employers support agency. Employers are struggling and are on their knees. I was talking to an employer recently who employs six or seven people in a small business. She is spending her life savings to try to keep the business afloat, but that cannot last beyond 2012. She will be broke, her life savings will be gone and so will her business. It is not good enough. State agencies must support businesses that are trying to maintain the status quo and keep people employed. Entrepreneurs will get us out of this mess, not unions and others sitting around tables who negotiated all these lovely deals. They wanted things to be grand and cosy, but the ordinary workers did not benefit.

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