Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I will use my time here to raise issues concerning workers and workers' rights, as is my right. Indeed, if there was any prospect of this debate being ruled out of order, it would not be happening. It is entirely appropriate to raise issues where victimisation is alleged and where the industrial relations mechanisms are not working for the people involved. This is a simple fact. Some of these workers will have to wait, potentially, for years now. We could get into a debate about how the Government has underfunded the WRC and we could probably be here all day talking about that. I do not thank the Minister of State, though, for a lecture about what is and is not contained within the industrial relations machinery. I know this. I also know there have been many debates on the floor of this Chamber on many occasions regarding workers' rights because this is an appropriate forum. I organised the briefing in the audiovisual room because I wanted to make our Deputies and Senators aware of what was happening and of this serious issue, and put on the record that while this is going on the Government has contracts or subcontracts with the company involved.

I welcome that the Minister of State is urging the parties to come together, but is she going to or is she prepared to do anything more than that? I ask this because these workers have, effectively, been locked out of their workplace. They want to be reinstated. They just want their jobs back. In their opinion, they have done nothing wrong and this matter may well be before the WRC at some point, but that is not a court either. This House is most definitely not a court, but it is a debating Chamber and I am entitled to ask on behalf of people what it is the Government might be prepared to do.

The Minister of State's script states that she "would urge the parties to come together in an effort to resolve the issues". Is she prepared to do any more than that? Does she think it is acceptable that these workers have, effectively, been locked out of their workplace? What they want to do is to get back to work. What they want to be able to do is to go back to earning money, which they had been doing to keep body and soul together.

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