David Cullinane (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Unfortunately the Dunnes Stores workers will be on strike on Thursday. I do not believe the workers want to be on strike. The last place they want to be is on a picket line but they have been left with no choice because of the actions of the company itself.

Dunnes Stores is a very profitable company and has treated many of its workers very shabbily down the years. Many of them are on contracts that guarantee very low working hours. They do not know from week to week how many hours they will have. The Mandate trade union conducted a survey which shows that 86% of workers said that the use of contracts by Dunnes Stores was a way to control and manipulate the workers. Many have their 15 hours spread over five days, which means they do not have access to any social welfare payment and they do not know from week to week or from day to day what hours they will have. They have no income security. That creates many problems. The Dunnes Stores workers are a section of workers in that sector, where there is a problem with low pay, precarious work and under-employment. There are unscrupulous employers who do not recognise the trades union, will not engage with trades union and do not treat their workers fairly but yet are making huge profits. It is not good enough. I am calling for a debate on the issue of precarious work and under-employment and the issue of contract work. There are companies and workers who will use part-time and contract work in a progressive way, because flexibility is important to some workers but it is also clear that some employers are using it for sinister reasons to control the workforce. That is not good enough. May I take the opportunity in the week that workers will be on the picket line, where they do not want to be, to have a debate on the issue of precarious work; it would do them justice. Let us put in place the solutions, because there are solutions and the debate would be the place to raise then.