Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

When I became the leader of the Labour Party, I asked my colleague the Minister of State, Deputy Gerald Nash, to bring together a low pay commission to deal with the issue of low levels of income. The Minister of State is undertaking, at my request, a study of the kind of conditions described, where people are on a low number of contracted hours. Although they are paid an hourly rate, if a person only receives ten hours a week, it is difficult to have the financial independence and wage levels needed to live a fully independent life and to provide for oneself and the family.

As a Government, we are working on that. I anticipate the Low Pay Commission's report will be brought before the Cabinet at the end of July and that it will form part of our deliberations with regard to the forthcoming budget, by means of which we hope to make further progress. This year we lessened the impact of the USC and removed 80,000 people from the low-pay net.

Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan referred to people who, for one reason or another, are not registered as being unemployed. As the number of those who are unemployed falls dramatically, it is important that we should seek to increase the number of opportunities on offer to people in terms of upskilling and returning to education in order that they might obtain qualifications. The latter is the route to well-paid employment. I will communicate further with the Deputy on this matter.

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