David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the Deputies who made contributions, including the Ministers and Teachta Niall Collins, whose views I strongly disagree with. I will get to some of that in a moment. I thank the Deputies of Independents 4 Change, the Labour Party speaker and other Independents who spoke in favour of the Bill. I also thank my colleagues in Sinn Féin who made contributions and will be supporting the Bill.

I listened to the contributions of the Minister, Deputy Mitchell O'Connor, the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, and an Teachta Collins and the first thing I said was "Roll on the day when Sinn Féin is in government and the day we have Sinn Féin Ministers sitting where they are sitting now". For all the talk we hear from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael about not wanting to talk to Sinn Féin or see us in Government, I have asked myself why that is so. It is because they do not think the same as us. They do not agree with basic rights. They do not believe a workers who is being victimised, on a low-hour contract or is employed by one of the multiples or a multinational company can be isolated and sometimes harassed and bullied by an employer and should have access to a trade union representative in the work place. They have no difficulty, of course, with employers having the right to highly paid human resource managers or very expensive barristers. I do not have a difficulty with that. The Ministers and Deputy Niall Collins seem to have a problem with ordinary working people having the basic entitlement to engage with trade union representatives in the workplace.

Some of the comments from the Ministers for opposing the Bill are laughable in the extreme but they have been outdone in the game by Fianna Fáil. I will go through some of the comments in the short time I have. It is extraordinary. The Minister spoke about balance but what has she done about the Vita Cortex issue raised earlier and redundancy payments being dealt with through legislation? Nothing. What has she done with if-and-when contracts and low-hour contracts? Nothing. What has she done with regard to trade union recognition? Nothing. What has she done about tactical insolvencies and not having the Clerys situation repeated? Nothing. She speaks about balance but she should tell that to the workers at Vita Cortex, Lagan Brick, TalkTalk, Waterford Crystal, Dunnes Stores or Tesco. All those workers have been treated disgracefully by employers in this State because they could do it. The Minister and Fianna Fáil have allowed it because they will not bring forward any reasonable legislation to deal with any of these issues.

We heard hollow words from an Teachta Niall Collins and it is quite clear he does not agree with the principle of the Bill.

If the Deputy had concerns with what the Government had called weaknesses and ambiguity in the Bill, which I do not accept, he could put forward amendments on Committee Stage. There have been several examples of Bills with which we have had difficulty and which were brought forward by Fianna Fáil, but which we supported on Second Stage on the basis that they could be dealt with on Committee Stage. Rather than throwing the baby out with the bath water and having no Bill whatsoever, one amends the Bill on Committee Stage. All I can take from the Fianna Fáil contribution is the brass neck of those Deputies who stand on picket lines with Tesco workers to show faith and feign solidarity and who then come here with their hollow comments and fake concern about flaws in the Bill. Deputy Niall Collins has a brass neck. He has absolutely no interest in the rights of working people.

The Minister talked about copy and paste. We made no secret of the fact that the Bill is built on what is called the gold standard on trade union access in New Zealand and Australia. I have spoken to trade union representatives who work the system in those countries and they say it works well. Employers' organisations in those countries also state it works well. I always hear from Fine Gael that the best way to resolve workplace conflict is through dialogue and discussion. If that is the case, why not allow it on the shop floor, in companies and in the workplace? What does the Government fear from an ordinary working person having an entitlement to deal with his or her trade union representative? What does Fianna Fáil fear from it?

All sorts of concerns were expressed about foreign direct investment. Many multinational companies in the State recognise trade unions and deal with them all around the world in multiple manufacturing plants. It is a false argument.

Deputy Niall Collins talked about ICTU, which has given the Bill its full support. It represents trade union officials who have been thrown out of companies, who have been refused permission to enter premises to even talk to their workers and turned away and who have faced intimidation because of unscrupulous employers. Many other trade unions have also given the Bill their full support.

Deputy Niall Collins stated the Bill failed to differentiate between unionised and non-unionised workplaces. This links in with some of what the Minister said when she painted a scenario in which 43 or 44 trade unions could be seeking to come into a premises and get time to speak to their representatives. It is nonsense. It is outrageous to put that proposition out as a credible reason for which the Government would oppose the Bill. Trade unions behave in a responsible way. Most trade unions operate in a company in which there is one trade union. They do not overlap. It is the nature of trade unions. The Minister knows it, yet she throws it out just to muddy the waters and confuse the issue. She knows it is not reality.

The Bill is based on a model that works in other countries. If there are flaws, why have those flaws not manifested themselves in Australia and New Zealand? However, if there are flaws and if the Minister really has concerns, she could have addressed them on Committee Stage.

The reason the Government supports the voluntary system is because it is a get-out-of-jail card for unscrupulous employers. In his speech, the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, stated the Bill "fails to properly appreciate the tried and trusted voluntary nature of industrial relations in Ireland". This is the same tried and trusted system that has resulted in disputes in Tesco, Dunnes Stores and all the other examples I gave, including Vita Cortex, Lagan Brick and Waterford Crystal, where workers' rights were trampled on by employer after employer. Tried and trusted? Spare me. What are needed on the Government benches are Sinn Féin Ministers who will actually deliver real workers' rights for people, not what we are getting from the Ministers who sit there now.

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