Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

This Bill does not seek to do anything more than implement a negotiated agreement. What I will not do in the context of the restoration of pay and conditions which were negotiated is provide those to people who are not party to the agreement. To do so would be unfair to those who are party to it. In the case of any union not complying with the terms of a negotiated agreement democratically voted upon and accepted by the majority of workers and endorsed by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, it would be extremely difficult to justify people who exclude themselves from that agreement being allowed to gain in respect of the positive side of the agreement while at the same time excluding themselves from doing things that their fellow workers, often in the same workplace, would undertake to do in terms of the maintenance of hours and other things required under the agreement. This is not unique to the public service. It applies to any negotiated agreement in any workplace.

I cannot envisage a situation where representatives of SIPTU or any union would go into a workplace to negotiate terms and conditions for members only to have one person say, "I will take the overtime rate increase and the additional pay, thanks very much, but I will not do the things the rest of my colleagues are doing". Would other workers be expected to accept that individual's position? That is just not the way collective bargaining works. It involves a representative sitting down and negotiating with an employer. Workers buy into the collective agreement or exclude themselves from it; they cannot buy into the good bits and exclude themselves from the parts they do not like. That is not how any agreement or negotiation, in the trade union or any other sphere, could or does operate.

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