Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I compliment the Labour Part on tabling the motion. For a reason that I will explain, I am delighted that Deputy Jan O'Sullivan is present. I knew Mr. Frank Prendergast well. He was a Labour Party Deputy from the same constituency as her and his constant theme was that the gap between the bottom and the top had widened inexorably over time, particularly through percentage increases. I took what he said seriously and the evidence would support him. This is bad for societal solidarity.

I realise the challenges. We live in an international world and there are international norms with which I do not agree, but they influence what happens on this island. The wider the gap between the very wealthy and the very poor, the more inexorable it becomes and the greater the disconnect in society. Therefore, this is a serious issue to be addressed and it must be examined in great detail. As a people, we must decide whether it is in anyone's interest to have an ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor. I remember asking someone who had come from what would today be considered a poor rural background and grown up on a small farm whether they had felt poor when young. I received an interesting answer: "No. Is mar a chéile muid uilig. We were all the same." Everyone was in the same boat; therefore, poverty was shared by the whole community. Unlike some places we might have in mind, for example, South America, people living in great poverty were not cheek by jowl with the wealthy. Frighteningly, though, it appears from the statistics that that is where we have moved during the years. I favour a high minimum wage to resolve this issue. Unfortunately, there is a danger that people might then believe the living or minimum wage should be universal rather than the floor below which one could not legally go.

What is happening at Tesco is scary. Workers are being told that their contracts will be ripped up and that they must regress. The zero-hour, if-and-when contracts seem to be unfair. When the complexity of an uncertain working arrangement is matched against the reality of the social welfare system, the situation becomes much worse.

While I hope the motion will be carried, we will not be able to resolve this issue in an hour and a half. In the previous Dáil we referred the oil and gas exploration issue to a committee. Everyone sat around the table and we arrived at a report what was agreed to unanimously. We did some serious work that influenced our oil terms. The issue before us today should be referred to a committee and the Oireachtas must examine all of its aspects. Our society must decide what shape it will take. We must decide whether it will be the law of the jungle or whether we will, as far as we can with what our society can control, no longer tolerate the ever-widening gap between the very rich and the very poor.

For many years I was de factoan employer because I was the manager of a co-op. I was in charge on a day-to-day basis, although I was subject to a local committee that was the ultimate owner alongside the shareholders. Whenever the union approached me, I put all of our wages, including mine, on the table. If I was claiming that the wages sought were not affordable when times were tight, it was the workers' right to know what everyone was earning, including the person on the largest salary. If a sacrifice was being sought, it had to be seen that an equal sacrifice was being made by everyone. In a company such a Tesco, however, the people at the top are earning megabucks, yet there is constant pressure downwards on the wages of ordinary people at the bottom.

When this debate ends, I hope we will not say we have had our big day in the sun in raising the issue before parking it quietly. It is too big for that. I hope this debate will encourage people to see that important detailed work needs to be done, with a great deal of background research, in order that the Oireachtas might reach a coherent view on workers' rights and relative salaries in our society. If we were to do this, we would do justice a service.

A very valid point was made on the radio some days ago that in many cases, the State has to supplement the wages of low-paid workers through the family income supplement, thus putting a burden on the taxpayer that the employer should bear.

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