John Paul Phelan (Fine Gael)

I do not agree with the Minister of State regarding amendment No. 4. The remit of a JLC should apply across the State, not to specific geographic areas, and it was to that the amendment applied. However, I will not press it at this juncture.

Regarding amendment No. 5, the Minister of State said that if it were accepted the JLC structure would be undermined and there would be deadlock. Surely the purpose of the committees in the first place was to have a meeting of minds between employers and employees. Invariably, each side comes to the table with its own perspective on an issue. If we are concerned with trying to reach a genuine agreement, surely the JLC is the right structure to achieve that, not by allowing the chairperson have the casting vote but by having genuine agreement between both sides. At present, that does not happen in practice in some JLCs. I do not question the credibility of people who fulfil the role of chairperson of JLCs at present but I believe their role would be strengthened if they were not permitted to have a casting vote when areas of disagreement arise. As it stands, the JLC structure was designed to try to achieve agreement between both sides within a particular sector. Amendment No. 5 would help to ensure that and therefore I press it.