Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Workers who are not on the sub-minimum rates - older workers - lose out because employers depend on people who they are paying the lower rates. It is actually the older workers who lose out in some of those industries in terms of what they are paid because of disproportionate dependence on people who are on sub-minimum rates.

I take the point that in many cases there is a very low proportion of people under those ages who are on the sub-minimum rates, but they are heavily concentrated in certain sectors. I do not believe that support in those sectors, which may well deserve support, should be dependent on the exploitation of young people, and that is what is happening. It is exploitation. I do not know why the Minister of State is shaking her head.

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