Brendan Ryan (Labour)

I thank the Minister of State, in spite of all my grumblings, for responding to a genuine issue. It is not easy to bring back legislation that has been around for four years. If a press release appears from me in which I make comments about incompetence that is part of politics. I appreciate the fact that the Minister of State did respond thoughtfully. In the later part of the debate we dealt with an issue that has interesting constitutional implications.

I wish the bodies well. We desperately need to deepen the concept of partnership. I am extremely unhappy — I have said this over and again — that one of the social partners, namely, the employers' group still has the right to refuse to allow its employees to be members of another one of the social partners and are de facto ensuring that many members are not in a trade union. Some 70% of the Irish workforce would like to be in a trade union but only 30% are in one. That other 40% are deterred, among other things, by the hostility of their employers. That is not a true spirit of partnership.

Arising out of these institutions, I hope people will have the right not to just to tolerate trade union membership but that it will be seen as a good thing for people to be members of trade unions and for trade unions to be involved in all forms of work. If that were the case it would deepen and extend partnership. The idea that a weakened trade union movement is anything other than bad for society, which wants to work by consensus, is a nonsense.