Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Amendment No. 9 has been ruled out of order. The right of access requires consultation with stakeholders, and it is not appropriate to include it in this Bill. I will not make a confirmation or commitment to support any legislation in the absence of seeing it.

I wish to take this opportunity, however, to refer, as I did in my concluding remarks on Second Stage, to an assertion that was made about the HSA only having 67 inspectors. I wish to clarify this because it was raised in the Seanad and I promised Deputy's colleague, Senator Gavan, that I would revert on it. He made the same assertion, but it does not take account of or acknowledge that an additional 500 inspectors were transferred from within the Civil Service pool who are complementing the work of the authority. We, therefore, have more than 550 people looking at the protocols. To be fair to the Deputy, earlier she acknowledged the good work that has been done by the various stakeholders, including the unions, on ensuring that the return-to-work protocols are good and mean something. There are the required numbers of inspectors to enforce this. We should also take comfort in the fact, and acknowledge that of the inspections that have been carried out to date, 92% of companies are operating appropriately and adhering to the protocols that have been agreed with the unions and the representative bodies of business. They are being implemented well. The other 8% need to up their game and acknowledge that they have a responsibility to adhere to the protocols just as the vast majority of people are currently doing.

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