Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

Section 12 inserts a new section 42A into the Act of 1946 to establish the principles and policies to which a JLC must have regard when formulating proposals to be submitted to the Labour Court for employment regulation orders. These principles and policies are set out in section 42A(6)(a) to (d). The Fianna Fáil amendment proposes to introduce the additional principle of the impact on working poverty and adequate income. The Bill already contains a number of principles to guide the joint labour committees, JLCs, in formulating proposals for wage rates that would cover the issues raised in this amendment, including the desirability of agreeing and maintaining fair and sustainable minimum rates of remuneration. In addition, the Bill as amended on Committee Stage makes provision in the principles and policies set out at section 12 to allow for an assessment of the general level of wages in comparable sectors. Where enterprises in the sector in question are in competition with enterprises in another member state, the general level of wages in the former are to take into account the cost of living in the member state concerned.

The Government amendment on Committee Stage sought to address the concerns voiced by trade unions and, during the Second Stage, by Deputy O'Dea. They urged that wage comparisons would not be used to undermine workers' purchasing power and that the range of comparable jurisdictions should be tightened so as to exclude those outside Europe. This provision was included.

Wage rates fixed under employment regulation orders, EROs, are set at levels higher than the national minimum wage. On average, these were approximately 10% higher than the minimum wage in 2010 prior to the wage's reduction by the former Government in February 2011. The factors that Deputy O'Dea is seeking to require JLCs to address are more appropriate to setting the level of the national minimum wage. An International Labour Organisation, ILO, survey of minimum wage conventions ratified by Ireland identified the national minimum wage as the wage considered sufficient to satisfy the worker's vital necessities of food, clothing, housing, education and recreation, taking into account the economic and cultural development of each country.

We are setting out the criteria that JLCs should consider. We have included the desirability of agreeing and maintaining fair and sustainable minimum rates of remuneration. I understand the Deputy's intent. If we were discussing the national minimum wage, for example, one would pursue deeper studies of working poverty and so on, but a JLC will set a pay level above the national minimum wage. A JLC is a committee of a specific subsector of the economy and draws people from both sides of the sector. It is not seeking to undertake in-depth research, as that would be more appropriate to a general setting of the national minimum wage. We have made adequate provision by setting out in the criteria the desirability of agreeing and maintaining fair and sustainable minimum rates of remuneration. Deputy O'Dea's amendment would add to this the complexity of an analysis of poverty and so on that would be more appropriate to the national minimum wage, not to a JLC seeking to set a sectoral premium over the minimum wage.

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