Liam Twomey (Fine Gael)

I wish to make a few brief points. The Minister of State made some comments, not related to this matter, about C2 contracts being abused in order that employers, especially in the construction sector, would not have to take on employees. Over recent years a similar accusation was made about general practitioners who took on locums for their holiday cover. The locums were not self-employed. Revenue made it clear that it would charge the general practitioners employers PRSI and make them responsible for the tax obligations of the locums and then that work practice changed overnight. Now locums are considered to be employees and tax and PRSI are paid accordingly. Apart from a very small percentage of people, that old work practice has essentially disappeared. The Minister of State could make a recommendation that Revenue would examine the number of C2 contracts that have been issued by people in the construction sector, issue a warning on this issue similar to the one they issued to the general practitioners, dentists and pharmacists and perhaps that would have the effect of changing work practices fairly quickly.

Mr. Liam Griffin, a hotelier in County Wexford, has expressed his view on this issue on local media. Knowing the type of person he is, I assume he has also contacted the Minister of State about it. Mr. Griffin said it is not sustainable to pay a student €22 an hour to collect glasses in any of his hotels on a Sunday afternoon. I do not believe he was talking about cutting the minimum wage. The minimum wage may impact on the cost per hour of employing a student, but I do not believe his approach would be to hammer everyone on the minimum wage in order that he could deal with specific problems in the hotel sector, entertainment business and throughout the services sector. What is at issue is the need to deal with some anomalies that exist that cause problems for employers in terms of retaining workers, developing their businesses and creating more jobs.

The Minister of State must acknowledge that the way the Government went about this has had the effect of hitting the lowest paid workers in our society. All workers have been dealt a blanket punch when action should have been taken to deal surgically with the problems in this area. This measure was an easy option for the Government. The Minister of State knows all the problems in this area which have been highlighted by people like Liam Griffin, other hoteliers, restaurant owners and service providers, not only in Country Wexford but throughout the country. They have been in contact with him. Rather than saying it would examine different policies and mechanisms such as joint labour committee agreements, the Government took the easy option to keep it going for a few months.