John Halligan (Waterford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

As noted by the European committee to which I referred, the human rights of workers in Ireland are being violated in three ways, namely, in respect of the failure to provide for trade union recognition and in aspects of the liquidation and insolvency processes. While I do not have any time for some of the current leadership of the trade union movement, legislation must be introduced to give workers a right to join a trade union without being vilified by the management of companies that refuse to recognise trade unions.

Is it right that when companies are liquidated workers are the last people to be paid? Whereas everyone else is paid by the liquidators, workers, even those with families, are told to go home and wait for 12, 14 or 16 weeks to receive a social welfare payment. Is it right that in the case of insolvency, a company can tell workers to take statutory redundancy, for which the State pays, before proceeding to reopen under another name and hire workers at lower wages? This is happening all over the country. I can cite four examples of this practice in my constituency and, as Deputy Boyd Barrett could tell us, workers who were sacked by a company that subsequently reopened under another name have been on strike for four years.

I ask the Taoiseach to carefully examine the three areas I have highlighted where the human rights of workers are being denied. Workers should have the right to join a trade union. They should be looked after when a company is liquidated by being paid the wages, overtime, holiday pay and so forth that they are owed, and for which they can wait years under the current system. Furthermore, if a company becomes insolvent, it should not be permitted to reopen under another name, selling the same products, having hired workers at a lower rate of pay.

See this speech in context