Derek McDowell (Labour)

Amendments Nos. 16, 19, 20 and 22 are in my name. Before the suspension of the sitting I had put a few questions to the Minister of State, specifically relating to the role of trade unions and the effect of section 6(3). Assuming there was a 10% threshold in place, I was seeking to inquire whether it was open to employers to tell employee members of a trade union that they were not going to deal with the union in circumstances where that was not the practice within a particular undertaking. I was also anxious to tease out whether section 6(3) means, in effect, that trade union officials could not be representative of employees within a particular enterprise.