Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

I ask the Minister of State if the Government accepts - I quote from The Guardian- that African and Asian migrant workers were being routinely but illegally used as cheap labour on Irish fishing trawlers working out of some of the country's most popular tourist ports. If that is accepted - it is good that it accepts the facts - why did the Government not do something about it? Rather than just repeating our last engagement from a couple of months ago I want to ask some more questions on the permit scheme. Were any representations made by fishing employer organisations to increase the number of permits from 500 to a higher number? Also, would the Minister of State agree that it is quite problematic to have the permits tied in to an employer? It obviously restricts the freedom and the relative power of the worker in the circumstance relative to the employer and the fishing industry.

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