Terry Leyden (Fianna Fail)

There were great difficulties and then other issues arose. The State can legally make ex gratia payments. The representative allowance for local authority members dated from the day the Minister published the Bill – that was retrospection – not the date on which it was actually passed. In this case, the Tánaiste has outlined that 25 May is the soonest date on which the President can sign the Bill. To put matters in context, one cannot legally impose a liability on employers to provide for retrospection. That is a fact, on which we should be clear. The Tánaiste's goodwill lies with the workers. She tried to do her utmost for them but was advised by the Attorney General that it was not possible. I hope there will be some way of resolving this issue and that workers will receive some form of ex gratia payments, particularly where employers did not pay above and beyond statutory redundancy payments. Let us be quite clear about this – if they paid above and beyond statutory redundancy payments, there are no grounds for an ex gratia or back payment. We will, I hope, do this. I accept that Senator Coghlan should revise the date to get it right but we will not accept his amendment.