Mary Ann O'Brien (Independent)

Having handed the Minister of State a nice puzzle to mull over, I do not propose to repeat myself. I will, however, refer to the case of a company in north Dublin on the edge of the senior Minister's constituency. A representative of the company which is American and has its headquarters in Columbus, Ohio was with me last evening. As I stated, it operates a red, amber and green system. In 2008-09 it was in danger of relocating to the Czech Republic. At the time the managing director took the difficult decision to make 50 permanent workers redundant and introduce an extremely lean cost structure. He outsourced the human resources department to an agency and employed 50 permanent agency workers at a new rate. The 50 permanent workers are earning approximately €45,000, including PRSI, per annum, while the agency workers are earning around €25,000 per annum, which equates to the salary the permanent workers earned when they started in the company some 15 years ago. The managing director is extremely worried and the flag has already been raised in Ohio. A meeting of the company's board will be held in April with a further meeting scheduled in October. The issue will be flagged at the April meeting and a decision taken in October. This is a major concern as the company is a multinational which has made a direct investment here.

The Minister indicated that jobs had not been lost in Britain as a result of the implementation of similar legislation. Britain opted to seek a 12 week derogation. I do not expect any job losses to occur for another year or 18 months.

On Monday last I was in the United States meeting an extremely good customer to discuss a contract worth €1.5 million which would be vital to my little company. Senator Mary White will note with glee that I am competing with the Belgians. I know precisely what the Belgians are charging the customer in question and the weight involved. I have the beating of the Belgians, but I am very worried about this agency directive. Perhaps I am a simpleton, but the manner in which our legislators have copied and pasted makes for convoluted legislation. My operations staff find the legislation unclear because it no longer reflects the EU directive. The Government has made it more complicated and added new provisions in the Bill which will add costs to my company this summer. As a result, we may no longer be competitive and I may not secure the contract to which I referred. I will find out on 18 March if we have won it because I am recosting it this afternoon based on the provisions of the legislation.