Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I did, and I will raise some issues regarding this amendment. On Second Stage, I raised these issues but there was no opportunity for the Minister to respond then. Given the substantial subsidies involved, and it is only right that that should be the case, there should also be some conditionality attached. One obvious area concerns conditions of employment. The Minister could have used this as an opportunity to ensure that employers treated workers properly regarding the right to collective bargaining and the right to representation in the workplace. It is regrettable that opportunity was not taken. The previous cut to the VAT rate could also have been used to ensure better quality employment, particularly in tourism and hospitality where conditions of employment are the worst of all industries.

We could have achieved a lot by attaching conditions to the previous VAT cut. That was a missed opportunity. The Minister should consider attaching similar conditions to the subsidies proposed in this legislation.

I earlier raised the issue of the cut-off figure of €151.50. It is difficult to understand why a subsidy is not being provided and perhaps the Minister would explain that. Why has he fixed that minimum figure of €151.50? My concern is that there is now a strong temptation for employers not to pay anybody less than €151.50 and it seems there is a strong incentive to achieve that by changing people's work rosters. That could easily entail people being expected to work longer hours regardless of whether that suits them in order to bring them up to that minimum figure. The corollary of that could be that other people in the company will have their hours cut to maximise the subsidies an employer can draw down.

The way in which the employment wage subsidy scheme, EWSS, is to be implemented is by means of a new PRSI class. There will be significant difficulties in implementing the scheme but if it happens, it will continue to mark or highlight an employee's payslip which, when viewed by banks or other third parties, could very much disadvantage that person in terms of being able to get a mortgage, loan or whatever. The Payroll Software Developers Association has drawn this to the attention of the Department and is providing an alternative way of processing payroll. I ask that the Minister remain open to the proposal of that organisation.

There will be substantial employer PRSI savings coming out of all of this. I wonder about the long-term implications of that for the Social Insurance Fund. Given that the level of employer PRSI in this country is much lower than it is in our European neighbours, that is a retrograde step. We should not be facilitating what might be close to a zero rate PRSI contribution from employers.

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