Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for selecting this topic. Christmas Grinch of 2017 goes to Capita PLC, the parent company of AMT-SYBEX, which has made at least six Unite members compulsorily redundant. We are now two weeks away from Christmas and Capita is refusing to abide by the Labour Court recommendations LCR 21574 which would give those workers, who have up to 20 years' service, five and half weeks redundancy pay per year of service instead of the statutory two weeks. This is a company which employs 73,000 people worldwide. It is a business services provider. It made a profit in excess of £500 million sterling in 2015 and 2016. Most importantly for our discussion here, 40% of its clients in Ireland are in the public sector, including the Department of Justice and Equality, the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, Fáilte Ireland and Irish Rail. It developed and runs Ireland's national postcode system, Eircode, and it has a contract to service Anglo Irish Bank loans on behalf of NAMA.

Replies to parliamentary questions have revealed that Capita currently holds contracts with the State worth approximately €140 million across a range of Departments and State enterprises. However, it treats the industrial relations machinery of the State with absolute contempt. It described the Labour Court redundancy recommendation of five and a half weeks' wages per year for staff who are being let go as inappropriate and not in line with company policy and went on to infer that the workers' decision to be collectively represented by a union of their choice, Unite, had contributed to the negative outcome of their appeal. The inference that a decision by workers to collectively organise in a union was a contributory factor in their dismissal again highlights the significant deficiencies in the industrial relations legislation and the ongoing failure to properly provide for collective bargaining.

The union has written to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe. There was a protest today, which I attended, outside the Department of Finance, to which another letter was handed in because no substantial response has yet been received to the letter of 18 October. I raise the matter to seek an answer to the key questions being asked by the union. Although the company cannot be made do what is right by the Government and it cannot be forced, as I think it ought, to pay at least the five and a half weeks' redundancy per year of service that was recommended by the Labour Court, the Government should make a policy decision that such rogue employers that refuse to engage with unions, as Capita refused to engage with Unite throughout the process, and refuse to implement the recommendations of our industrial relations machinery should not be facilitated by the State. There should be a policy decision not to award any more public contracts to companies such as Capita that refuse to implement Labour Court decisions in this way.

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