Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left) | Oireachtas source

I strongly concur with Deputy Pringle's concluding remarks. While all Deputies will welcome the Bill up to a point, it is long overdue and pretty underwhelming in the context of the challenges that arise in this area. The Bill has been packaged as progress but it simply reinstates the position that obtained in 2007. That is not good enough on the part of the Labour Party, which claims the legacy of James Connolly.

The background to the Bill is the Ryanair v. the Labour Court and IMPACT case, which encapsulated the voluntarist tradition of collective bargaining in place here. This case has had a chilling effect across industry in the intervening years, including the four years since the Government took office. During this period, the Labour Court has been used much less to rule on industrial relations disputes. The programme for Government included a promise to reform the current law on the right of employees to engage in collective bargaining to ensure compliance by the State with recent judgments of the European Court of Human Rights. While it is good that we have finally had sight of the Bill four years after the programme for Government was published, it is not exactly great for workers at Dunnes Stores who have been victims of some of the practices the legislation belatedly attempts to address. People are being victimised for their participation in trade disputes. For example, 20 workers at Dunnes Stores have been sacked and a brutal regime of intimidation is being directed daily at workers who remained in the company on the basis that they engaged in industrial action.

Deputies will be familiar with last year's bitter dispute at the Greyhound company where workers were locked out of their employment in Dublin for 14 weeks. It is good that the Bill provides that employers will not be able to lock out workers who are covered by a registered employment agreement, REA. As previous speakers stated, however, it is not the case that a registered employment agreement is a panacea to the problems.

While Deputies will welcome the decision to implement some of the measures provided for in the Bill, they are being introduced a little late. It is an insult that the Government was able to ram through the sale of Aer Lingus in one and a half days, without notice, yet it has dragged its heels for four and a half years on this legislation. As part of the debate on the sale of the State's shareholding in Aer Lingus, Government speakers placed great stock on registered employment agreements, portraying them as a get out of jail for free card or guarantee against all eventualities. This is not the case because REAs only cover terms and conditions and will not protect Aer Lingus employees against outsourcing, job losses and so forth. Democratic trade unions that are willing to fight are the only way to provide such protection.

Ryanair, the company whose action gave rise to the legislation, still does not recognise trade unions. Its staff are placed on airport stand-by, which requires them to hang around an airport for eight hours in case another staff member does not show up. While at the airport, they are required to sell rail and bus tickets, for which they receive a sum of €30 which equates to a payment of approximately €3.75 per hour. They may work for 12 hours without a break, the company does not respect rest periods and sick pay requirements and wages are based on flight time, even though staff are subject to mandatory hanging around periods. Sales targets are linked to pay, which means staff on a flight to Manchester must start selling products on board, even as the aircraft is climbing, which is in contravention of safety regulations.

There is no doubt that the Government's failure to act quicker on this vital legislation has had a chilling effect during its years in office. In that four-year period, wages across the economy have declined by 2%. One could ask whether this was a deliberate policy. The Government, in ostensibly reforming the joint labour committee, JLC, system, effectively gutted it. The most vulnerable workers in sectors such as retail, accommodation and catering have not been protected.

Deputies have spoken about collective bargaining but does the Bill really amount to collective bargaining? While the legislation is welcome, the most glaringly omission is the absence of a requirement on employers to recognise and engage with trade unions. The greatest fault in the legislation is that it maintains Ireland's voluntarist system of industrial relations which IBEC argues is vital. As such, the Government is dancing to IBEC's tune.

The definition of the term "collective bargaining" is weak and does not offer sufficient protection to workers. The Bill refers to voluntary engagement between employers and trade unions or accepted bodies. We do not know what constitutes "engagement" and I am certain lawyers in the Labour Court will exploit this vagueness to the detriment of workers. Neither the Labour Court recommendation nor international collective bargaining legislation contains the phrase "voluntary engagement". What does this term mean?

A number of other issues also need to be addressed. Previous speakers made critical points about pensioners who are denied a pathway into the industrial relations machinery on the basis that they are not deemed to be employees, despite valid issues arising that relate to their previous employment and affect their material well-being. This issue needs to be addressed.

While the Bill does something to improve the lot of workers, restoring the position that obtained in 2007 is inadequate and it needs to be drastically changed.

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