Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House and thank him for the opportunity to speak on this Bill. Our world changed last year and not for the better. The financial crisis is not understood in this country. While I am aware we will have an opportunity to speak about the economy in approximately half an hour I want to at this stage to touch on how our world has changed. The crisis affects everything. Many of the topics upon which the Minister of State touched, which appeared normal and assumed criteria in the past, no longer apply to the same extent. We no longer have that luxury. We now have to borrow €400 million every week and I do not know whether we will be able to continue to do that. We must cut expenses and find a way to become more competitive.

I touch on these issues having just read the National Competitiveness Council document on the competitiveness of our nation. I do not believe this matter is understood. I would like to touch on this subject in so far as it relates to this particular issue. Approximately six or eight months ago, Senator Ross and I were contacted by O'Briens Sandwich Bars who wished to employ people on a Sunday and could not do so because they could not afford the rates of pay agreed between employers and the unions. They found that although there were people who were willing to work at the rate they were willing to pay, they could not employ them on that rate because they would be in breach of the ERO regulations. While this may have made sense three or five years ago - I do not believe it did - it no longer makes sense. The Minister of State mentioned that some of these figures have been adjusted.

We pass regulations and rules to legitimise agreements made between employers and employees. I am concerned we are still living in the past and do not recognise that the employment regulation orders in place are far too difficult to maintain. The Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment met yesterday with a deputation from the newsagents and independent grocers who said they could employ more people but could not pay the agreed rates and as such would be in breach of the regulations. It is time to acknowledge that the EROs were good in the past but that that is no longer the case.

I have made the point in the past that some jobs do not exist at a certain rate. I was involved in the supermarket business. There was a time when we were able to employ people to pack bags for customers or to take their trolleys to their cars. They were not highly paid jobs but they were the first step on the ladder. In later years, we were unable to do that. I am not suggesting they were great jobs. Mr. Bill Cullen's book, It's a Long Way from Penny Apples, a book everybody should read, tells how when he started work in a garage his job was cleaning windscreens and so on and how when times were tough and people were being let go he was kept on because he was enthusiastic about his job. We must be careful to ensure we do not, with the best will in the world, put in place restrictions or legitimise agreements between employers and employees that in effect hinder or stifle the opportunity to create jobs that may be first steps on the ladder.

I am concerned that consumers are not taken into account in this legislation. Long before the Minister of State was born, back in the late 1960s or early 1970s, I fought a case in the Supreme Court against early closing legislation that had been enacted in 1938. That legislation stated that if employers and employees in a certain business agreed on certain closing times or early opening hours they had to apply to everybody. That legislation was in operation from 1938 to 1969 when I found a loophole in it and challenged it in the courts. I mention this because it relates to two groups, employers and employees, who entered into an agreement which was in their interests but ignored the interests of the consumer. The same is happening here.

A few months ago, when in Dundalk to say goodbye to some staff who had worked for years in a supermarket that was closing, I suggested to some of the butchers that they might find work in Newry and they told me they would not work there because they would be paid only one third of what they earned in Dundalk. I am not suggesting this is based on any agreement between unions and employers. However, if we remain uncompetitive we will lose business, be it to Northern Ireland or somewhere else. We will lose the jobs we would have had ourselves. If we institutionalise by agreements between employers and employees that apply to everybody else, there is a danger we will become even more uncompetitive than we are.

Senator Boyle referred to our high minimum wage rates and almost excused them by saying that the cost of living here is high, which is chicken and egg. Our cost of living is high because of high rates, which are to a certain extent institutionalised by the agreements we are speaking about. One of the chief arguments used by employers who challenged the pay deals in court was that they were not sanctioned by the Oireachtas. This Bill will address that issue.

It should be noted that this legislation is an example of how the Oireachtas controls the national minimum wage and the sectoral pay rates agreed through registered employment agreements and employment regulation orders. I am concerned that while such arrangements may be the right approach to take in the long term, in a time of crisis such as this - unfortunately, as a nation we have not recognised its full extent - the priority must be to take action to contain employment costs and make ourselves more competitive. These types of agreements between employers and employees are fine when they apply only to the parties concerned, but a more general application is not the correct approach to take. Therefore, I question the entire objective of what we are seeking to achieve in this legislation.