Terry Leyden (Fianna Fail)

I also welcome the Minister of State and his officials to the House to introduce the Employee (Provision of Information and Consultation) Bill 2005.

I note the length of time it has taken from the issuing of the directive to the enactment of the legislation before the House. I welcome the fact that the Minister of State has stated that he is prepared to consider amendments by all Members. There is a range of people in this House with experience in this area. They will be able to give some assistance to the staff of the Minister of State.

The Minister of State has set a magic number of 50 employees per company. Is this negotiable or is it part of the directive itself? Is it only applicable to companies with more than 50 employees? It is very important that all labour-related legislation be brought together in one Bill, or at least put into an information pack for employees. People should know all of the legislation that governs employment in Ireland and employees should be well aware of their rights. There is much legislation brought through both Houses that is often not acted upon. When this Bill is enacted, I hope the Minister of State engages his staff to inform employers and employees of this particular piece of legislation.

The greatest amount of non-consultation occurs in the public service. For example, nurses in hospitals often complain that they are never consulted about hospital management. There is certainly a lack of consultation from management to workers. Are we excluding the public service and, if so, why? That applies to all public service institutions that employ over 50 people.

As a former chairman of the Western Health Board, I have often found that the manager of a particular institution has complete control and there is very little consultation with the workers. There might be workers' groups and consultative councils and I feel that is an area in which it is worthwhile to empower the employees in the management of their organisations. That would apply to the work that many of them are undertaking at the moment. In the new HSE — which has not changed at all from the old health board system- I find it an appalling waste of time that the annual review of medical cards follows the same procedure. There may be no change in a person's circumstances, yet time and energy is wasted researching the person's situation to come up with the same result every year. Staff will complain that they could be better engaged in other types of work than doing this on a yearly basis. If the staff were allowed more consultation at all levels, companies would be far stronger and that is why I welcome the Bill. It will allow employees the opportunity to have direct consultation with the management of a company. Senator Quinn outlined very well how he operated this in his company for so many years and it was very successful on that basis. I welcome his input on this issue, along with that of Senator O'Rourke, Senator White and others. On this side of the House, we will not be putting down amendments, but we will rely on the Minister of State to put them on our behalf if we consider there are areas that could be amended to the benefit of the Bill.

Too many directives have been issued by the EU on this issue. This directive was agreed on 11 March 2002 after extensive consultation and it is now September 2005. It was right and proper that there was also consultation with the social partners. Senator O'Rourke pointed out that education was the main reason for the strength of our economy and that social partnership was the second reason. Social partnership in this country is a shining example to other countries. It is progressive and consultative and that is what we want. The Bill will allow for proper consultation to take place between employees and employers. It provides a framework for consultation in a comprehensive way. I very much welcome the Bill and I compliment the Minister of State and his Department. He has been very innovative since he became Minister of State with responsibility for labour affairs and he has well qualified staff with him.

The recent ESB crisis provides a great opportunity for consultation for all unions. There is a shared management and union position which has been well worked out, yet there are a bunch of rebels who have been trying to upset the whole applecart. I am pleased that ultimately, sense prevailed. I hope they learned the lesson that there is an opportunity for consultation. I welcome the fact that the other unions involved were prepared to take on these rebels and passed the pickets, as it was not a justified dispute at that stage. The action put jobs and the economy in jeopardy. Certain individuals had no regard for the Irish economy and they were prepared to do the same thing at Irish Rail, but they failed there as well.