Paul Coghlan (Fine Gael)

I also welcome the Minister of State and his officials to the House and I thank the Labour Party for bringing this motion to the floor of the Seanad. It gives the House a chance to bring up many of the issues that are raised in the Labour Party document, entitled A Fair Place to Work and Live, and many other issues which have been the talk of the nation for some years.

Nobody could have failed to detect the palpable sense of dismay and anger over recent events at Irish Ferries and Gama. Before getting into the detail of what the Labour Party is proposing, I want to comment on these disgraceful developments. As regards Irish Ferries, the fact that a former State company would resort to such Dickensian tactics in order to cut costs without the slightest concern for the workers whose livelihoods it was destroying, is nothing short of scandalous. Whatever captain of industry decided that this was a good idea should be ashamed of himself or herself. The developments in Irish Ferries are significant not just because of those whom they directly affect. Every employee in the country is looking at Irish Ferries and reflecting that this could be him or her. We have a duty in this House to ensure this does not happen.

In late 1999 Irish Ferries announced that it was to spend €17 million on purchasing the ship, M.V. Normandy. It is extraordinary that only five years after such an enormous capital outlay it tried to take the by now infamous remedial action. The House should know that in May 2005 it became known that Irish Ferries was one of the main beneficiaries of the so-called tonnage tax scheme. It saved an estimated €3 million in tax payments in 2003, the first year of the scheme's operation. The House should also know that it was made clear at that time that without the tax break jobs would be lost. The House is well aware of the industrial relations pariah that Irish Ferries became when it decided that it was perfectly acceptable to pay a Filipino worker just one euro an hour to work on one of its ships. All of this came from a company that apparently buys into social partnership, a project that has served both Irish Ferries and the nation well.

Similarly, revelations regarding foreign workers in Gama Construction are shameful. I sincerely hope that the labour inspectorate of the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment investigates, prosecutes and punishes those responsible for any impropriety, exploitation and fraud that may have taken place. However, if any good is to come from this development, perhaps we may finally see the emergence of a proper rational debate on immigration and thought-out Government policy on the subject.

The findings of last week's TNS-MRBI opinion poll in The Irish Times, where a majority of voters indicated their support for the reintroduction of work permits for eastern European workers, is hardly surprising. However, we must look beyond this to what the country really needs. Fine Gael believes the country should be upfront and honest about the need for immigration, the benefits it can bring and the repercussions of not welcoming inward migration. It is a simple fact that Ireland will need to import the skills needed to ensure that we remain a world-class player.

The economy has the potential to post cumulative growth of 45% between now and 2016, with the performance to be fuelled by immigration, according to Goodbody Stockbrokers. Growth of this magnitude would see Ireland expanding at more than twice the rate of the average eurozone economy over the next decade. Goodbody went so far as to say that for this growth to be achieved, inward migration must play a vitally important role. Against that background we have the absurd farce of the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform deporting and then bringing back leaving certificate students and construction companies paying migrant workers a euro an hour to build this country, quite literally.

As a public representative, I am tired of this phoney debate. I am tired of the constant portrayal of immigration as a problem. It may be politically astute to give the nod to the baser instincts of some of the electorate, but it is foolish to think that without a flow of migrant labour to staff the service and construction industries the economy can survive. I ask those who complain that there are too many foreigners working here to ask themselves honestly who will staff our hospitals and our restaurants. How will our tourism industry operate without the necessary staff? How will our service industries survive? Where will we get builders and construction workers or computer programmers? All of these areas — and more — suffer from staff shortages, which would be much worse were we to close the door on foreign workers.

My party shares the concern that the motion expresses as regards the EU services directive. Fine Gael fully supports the free movement of goods, services and labour within the European Union. We are the most pro-European party in the Oireachtas, and view the EU as a force for good in this country and beyond. It has been the EU, in many instances, that has dragged Ireland kicking and screaming into the 21st century on everything from the rights of women to worker protection.

However, we cannot agree with the services directive in its current form. The European People's Party, EPP, of which we are part, would not support the country of origin principle and it cannot be implemented without the EPP's approval. There is much to be welcomed in the directive. Moves to give consumers greater choice, to improve efficiency, promote competition and widen markets are all very good. What is not good, however, is the suggestion that someone from Poland should be exploited in this country at a wage rate that is significantly below the minimum rate of pay for Irish workers. The repercussions of such a disastrous policy would be felt not merely in an industrial context — although it would obviously have industrial ramifications.

Without going over the top, we risk creating a whole new underclass of underpaid and undervalued foreign workers if we go down this road. It is not an enormous step for our growing immigrant population to become disillusioned with this country. Given a mixture of poverty, disillusionment and a lack of any sense of participation in our society, ghettoisation, cultural separation and even crime can become rife. Ireland is well placed to avoid the mistakes of the United States, Britain and France in this area. We can avoid ethnic ghettos and a two or three-tier society. However, we can only avoid these pitfalls if we enshrine equality as a basic tenet of our approach.

On other points raised by the motion, I fully support the call to properly resource the labour inspectorate and collect better data on the issue. This and many other areas of Irish life suffer from a data deficit that exacerbates the problems. We also fully support the green card system referred to.

Since the publication of the Employment Permits Bill, the Minister has referred to green cards in an effort to suggest his Department has come up with a comprehensive and compassionate answer to the problems faced by the migrant workers who make such a contribution to the economy. The last time I checked, Irish citizens had the right to quit any job they liked and look for another one. However, the Bill does not give immigrants the complete freedom to do that because it does not give the employee rights over his or her employment status. While the Bill makes it easier for migrant labour to move jobs, I am at a loss to know why the Minister did not go all the way and grant the green card to the employee and not the employer. We support the Labour Party motion.