Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to raise the issue of the closure of Clerys and the unceremonious dumping of 130 direct employees and some 430 others who worked within the store. The Taoiseach has described the manner in which all this happened as "insensitive" but that is the wrong word. The manner in which all this happened is absolutely scandalous and the righteous anger of the workers and, more broadly, of the public was in plain view outside the store yesterday where workers met to assert their fundamental right to respect at work and to protest at the manner in which Clerys was closed and their livelihoods snatched from them.

As the Tánaiste knows, the workers were given no notice, no explanation and deserved, apparently, no regard or consideration, despite that many of them had given literally their entire working lives to Clerys. What is most scandalous in this whole scenario is that all these events were planned and did not happen by accident. I have heard some say that it would have taken a month, possibly, for management and owners to manoeuvre and choreograph the sequence of events and, more scandalously again, all of this, it seems, was entirely legal. We have a scenario where Gordon Brothers, vulture capitalists from Boston, walk away with their pockets full to the tune of €29 million while workers and the State are left to pick up the pieces.

I have three specific issues I wish to raise with the Tánaiste. First, for the workers in the here and now, I ask her to outline the situation with regard to the processing of their individual claims, that is, their right to back pay, holiday pay and their redundancy entitlements. Second, as far as I am aware, Natrium Limited, which has acquired Clerys, continues to refuse to meet the workers or their representatives. Third, and most importantly in the long term, will the Tánaiste outline her plans to amend legislation or introduce new legislation to ensure scandals such as this are squarely illegal and workers are fully protected?

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