Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

While I do not work there, I want to refute what the Minister has just said. Approximately 300 of the 500 employees work under the auspices of an agency called eFlexes. I have to hand copies of the contracts stating that eFlexes reserves the right to change a person's working hours at any time, provided the person is told about this and the company hears the person's reasonable objections. I have evidence that people who have objected to being told at the last minute that they must work for the next 15 hours have been threatened with the loss of their contracts. There is also an interesting procedure in the disciplinary section which I have never seen before in any contract of employment. It sets out that a person who is subject to a serious investigation of ill discipline may be suspended without pay pending the investigation. Garda Commissioner Nóirín O'Sullivan, should she be suspended, will be suspended with pay because that is in the contract of most employees in the country; the opposite is the case with this contract.

I argue that there are serious breaches of the concepts of work and lifestyle decency within these types of new jobs that we are celebrating. It is part of the Minister's brief to examine and watch over what is happening in the employment arena in this country.

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