Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is not the Soviet Union. This is a democracy and people are allowed to make submissions. The Deputy pointed out that 118 submissions were made, some by employees and some by employers. Some of them were by paid advocates and some of them were by people who were none of those things. They are entitled to make their views known. I do not believe that employers and business people are the enemy here. It is absolutely right that we would listen to their views and not shut them out from policy making. The same applies to unions. I always listen to all sides when it comes to making decisions like this.

This is a Government commitment. I am leading it. We will introduce statutory sick pay this year. The legislation will certainly be done this year with the Deputies' co-operation and will come into effect at the end of the year or no later than early next year. We are looking at international comparisons. For example, Northern Ireland has a statutory scheme paying £90 a week which is totally inadequate in my view. It will need to be much better than that, for example. We need to bear in mind that many businesses are suffering.

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