Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 13:

In page 17, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following:“(6) The Minister may authorise other persons, including designated union officials, to carry out inspections and monitoring of Registered Employment Agreements, Registered Employment Orders and Employment Regulation Orders.

(7) The Minister may make regulations providing access, for union officials, to the workplace and employees for the purpose of this Act.

(8) An employer shall not coerce workers to relinquish or abstain from a registered employment agreement.”.

These amendments arise from the fact there are massive compliance and enforcement problems within the labour market in this State. These enforcement and compliance levels are a disaster for individuals. Legislation is not worth a damn if it is not enforced or complied with. We can have all the talk and debates in this Chamber about it but it is no use if the necessary mechanisms are not in place. The Minister of State might tell us what are the levels of compliance in all of the different sectors, given I am told that non-compliance is very high in a number of different sectors.

As I have mentioned previously, one of the best ways to ensure compliance or enforcement is to allow for the natural equilibrium between workers and employers to exist. We should give them both the necessary influence and power to be able to have an equal relationship and, in that equal relationship, we are most likely to have resolution of problems without them going any further. It is when the ability of the workers to represent themselves and have their issues dealt with is suppressed that we are forced down the route of making the State responsible for compliance. We know this costs an awful lot of money to put in place, is not very successful and, in many areas, is extremely unsuccessful for a large number of reasons. Even where it does work, it is often far too late to have an impact on the individual's core experience.

Prior to the McGowan judgment, these entitlements were part and parcel of the REA framework underpinning the right of an individual to trade union representation and all that representation entails. Would we have any other case where an expert professional who is entitled to represent an individual would not have access to that individual or the circumstances that individual is experiencing? I imagine we would not. In the case of solicitors, for example, that is what we would provide for. These three amendments simply create a natural equilibrium between both groups and they simply let individual trade union representatives gain access to where the problem is. It is not revolutionary and it mirrors what was previously the case. For decent employers, it is not a threat because decent employers will not find themselves suffering in any way from this process.

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