Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am interested in a resolution of this and I am not going to pretend that there will be an optimal solution. I do not want to take people up a hill and bring them back down again empty-handed. My assessment of this is that of course the workers have been treated very badly by the company. The company has gone into liquidation. It is in difficulty in the UK. As the Deputy knows, the UK does not want to know about it. Mandate and ICTU have worked on this and I intend to engage further with them.

I have asked my officials to review the entirety of this to see what can be done practically. It is all very well to articulate the issue as well and as eloquently as the Deputy does, but we all have to work within the law. The Government cannot instruct the liquidator or the High Court process. The Deputy knows that. There are legal frameworks we have to navigate. That is the reality. Every politician would love to say to everybody that they would love to resolve an issue and provide funding. Unfortunately, it is never that simple. Others may pretend and articulate that it is, but it never is.

I admire and salute the strength, courage and tenacity of the workers. The Government provides statutory redundancy and so on. We are now entering into new territory. Where I see things evolving is that employers can renege on their obligations in the future if the Government is always there to bail them out. That is a potential solution. Irrespective of companies reneging on or failing to honour their collective agreements, the Government ends up being the bank of last resort of those collective agreements.

The legislation should be changed in order to put workers on a par with others. In other words, where a legal collective agreement has been entered into workers should be on the same level as every other creditor in terms of getting their entitlements and obligations. That is something that will need to be changed. Whether such a change, even if introduced in the short term, can be applied retrospectively is an issue.

In the meantime, my focus, notwithstanding yesterday's court decision, is to see whether we can create some space to assess whether something can be done to alleviate the situation for the workers concerned. As I said, I have asked my officials to look at this issue. Whatever we can do legally and in a sensible way we will do. I have remained in contact with the workers on this.

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