Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will take note of the Deputy's concerns, which the Minister, Deputy Mitchell O'Connor, and I will try to rectify. We must examine the report, why it was commissioned and the recommendations in it. As the Deputy pointed out, while zero hours contracts are not often used in industry, the "if and when" approach is used, whereby people are not contracted to make themselves available. Outside of these, there is a lack of clarity regarding the employment status of many people who want to work, particularly in the hours the Deputy mentioned. As I previously said, we are concerned about the unpredictability of the hours and the difficulty of managing family life for people who have this type of uncertain employment, and the unstable income, which I mentioned earlier, which means people cannot get access to finance. A consultation process is in place. It finishes on Friday. We will take note of all the submissions, meet some of the interested parties, if necessary, and make our report.

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