Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the House for the opportunity to outline the Government's position on the Protection of Employment (Uncertain Hours) Bill 2016. The Government accepts it is well intentioned and its stated objective is to provide greater protection for employees by more effectively regulating zero hours and related employment practices. The Government does not oppose the principle of the Bill, but it cannot support the specific provisions put forward in it for several reasons.

I acknowledge the particular interest Senator Gerald Nash has in this area and his role during the term of the previous Government in commissioning the University of Limerick, UL, study into the prevalence of zero-hour and low-hour contracts in the economy, along with their impact on employees. When he was a Minister of State at the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Senator Gerald Nash was very much respected in the Department for the significant amount of work he put into this specific area. This Bill is clearly in response to the UL study. Unfortunately, it is a limited response which does not address several key recommendations for legislative changes made in the UL report. The Bill also contains proposals for legislative changes in respect of which the UL study made no specific recommendations for legislative change. Most importantly, the Bill appears to contain no provisions to address the impacts or unintended consequences of the proposed changes.

It is worth recalling the main findings of the UL study. It found that zero-hour contracts, as defined within current employment rights legislation, are not extensively used. It found low working hours can arise in different forms in employment contracts. The UL report made a range of recommendations relating to contracts, hours of work and notice, minimum hours, how contracted hours should be determined, collective agreements, data gathering and wider contextual issues.

The programme for Government contains a commitment to tackle the problems caused by the increased casualisation of work and to strengthen regulation of precarious work. The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, who is abroad this week on a trade mission, is committed, along with the Minister of State with responsibility for employment and small business, to bringing forward proposals for legislation to protect workers on low-hour contracts as a follow-up to the UL study. The Ministers' proposals will take account of the large number of submissions received in response to the public consultation on the study. Those responses reflect a broad range of views, many of which are diametrically opposed views. A considerable amount of work has been carried out by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation in assessing those submissions, as well as developing proposals which aim to provide balanced and workable solutions to the recommendations made in the UL study. The Ministers' proposals will address the issues of insecure, low hours work in a more comprehensive but also more balanced manner than the approach taken in this Bill. The Ministers' proposals will address the concerns expressed in the UL study and in the public consultation about the need to improve the predictability of working hours for workers on insecure, low-hour contracts.

The issue of contracts indicating low-hour requirements and not reflecting workers working much higher hours over significant periods will be addressed. The proposals will also seek to ensure workers are better informed about the nature of their employment arrangements, as well as their core terms and conditions at an early stage in their employment. The Ministers' proposals will include provisions aimed particularly at low paid, more vulnerable workers in terms of the minimum compensation for being called in to work and sent home again. The Ministers' proposals will recognise that casual working, as well as if-and-when arrangements, can suit both employees and employers in certain circumstances. The proposals will not, therefore, have the effect of eliminating casual working in all circumstances. This is in contrast to the proposals contained in this Bill.

The Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation is currently engaged in an intensive dialogue process with both the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, ICTU, and the Irish Business and Employers Confederation, IBEC, where all parties wish to secure broad agreement before finalising the proposals. This ongoing dialogue process has allowed for the impacts and unintended consequences of the Ministers' proposals to be identified, assessed and adjusted to ensure the negative impacts of the legislative changes are minimised or avoided. In this respect, the Ministers have been made aware in the development of their proposals, and based on submissions on behalf of employers, that there are many situations where casual or on-call or if-and-when needed arrangements apply, such as in the health care sector, in respect of section 39 service providers, and the education sector.

The Ministers also recognise these arrangements may suit employees and employers in certain circumstances, a point which the UL study acknowledged. However, the Labour Party Bill would in effect end these arrangements in all circumstances with potentially negative impacts on employment levels and service delivery in sectors such education, health care, elder care and social care. These are sectors which rely on the flexibility provided by such arrangements to meet peaks in demand, customer needs and regulatory requirements.

The Bill contains several provisions, which taken together, would make it virtually impossible for genuine casual employment arrangements to operate in the labour market. This would be an inappropriate and disproportionate response to the questions raised by the UL report about the use of if-and-when arrangements. The UL study acknowledged the flexibility offered by genuine if-and-when contracts can be mutually beneficial for employers and employees. For employers in certain sectors, they provide the flexibility needed to run their business. For example, in the hospitality and hotel sector, it can allow an employer call in additional staff to service weddings and other functions as required. In the health sector, these arrangements can help employers satisfy a peak in demand and to fill staffing gaps on a short term basis.

From a worker's perspective, these arrangements can meet the needs of those who want or need more flexible working arrangements. For example, it can suit students, older workers, individuals who need to balance work with caring responsibilities or highly skilled and highly paid individuals who choose to avail of such arrangements for lifestyle reasons and to supplement a more stable income.

On a more general note, the Government remains committed to delivering a social economy model to deliver a strong economy and a fair society. The maintenance and improvement, where possible, of strong protections for workers has been, and will continue to be, a key element of the Government's policy as we look to build on the progress made in recent years in our economic recovery.

In this respect, several major reforms have been made in recent years in the area of employment rights and industrial relations, including the most significant reform in the history of the State of the workplace relations machinery for the vindication of individual employee rights; the levelling of the playing field for agency workers by affording them equal treatment in respect of their basic working and employment conditions; the enactment of the Industrial Relations (Amendment) Acts 2012 and 2015 which have re-established the joint labour committee and registered employment agreement wage-setting mechanisms which were found to be unconstitutional; reform of the law on employees' right to collective bargaining; and the establishment of the Low Pay Commission.These reforms are in addition to the existing specific protections in our employment law for those who work on a part-time or temporary basis. For example, a part-time employee cannot be treated less favourably than a comparable full-time employee.

Employee protection legislation applies to a part-time employee in the same way as it applies to a full-time employee. Fixed-term workers may not be treated less favourably than comparable permanent workers. All temporary agency workers have a right to equal treatment with regular workers from their first day at work. There are people who say that the previous Government did nothing for the working man or woman. I refer those people to the increase in the minimum wage provided for under the last Government despite that we are in the midst of the worst ever recession in the history of this State. The then Government, comprised of Fine Gael and the Labour Party, in providing for this increase recognised the needs of the working man and the working woman.

In addition to the reform of our employment rights and industrial relations regime, our continued economic recovery and, in particular the progress made in reducing unemployment, is also important in providing better opportunities for all. In this respect, I welcome the latest employment figures which show that unemployment at below 8% is continuing to fall. The live register has dropped below 300,000 and the number of people employed exceeds 2 million. In the year to October 2016, the number of casual and part-time workers decreased by 5,748 or 8.8%. These figures are encouraging. That is not to suggest, however, that there are not many challenges to be addressed in terms of improving protections, particularly for low paid, vulnerable workers. Neither is it to suggest that the improving position in employment and job creation will of itself improve the position of vulnerable workers. On the contrary, many of those who might be considered to be vulnerable, low-paid workers would include individuals who may have several years and more of service to an employer but they may be working on a contract indicating low-hour requirements and not reflecting much higher hours worked over significant periods or they may have concerns about the predictability of their hours and, therefore, their income and about being called into work for unreasonably short periods of continuous work. These are some of the key issues which the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and the Minister of State with responsibility for employment and business are seeking to address. In doing so, their proposals will be a more balanced and comprehensive response to the UL study, more focussed on vulnerable, low-paid workers and nuanced so as to avoid or minimise unintended consequences and their impacts. The proposals will also have the benefit of having been subject to an intensive dialogue process with ICTU and IBEC, with a view to getting broad agreement.

In contrast to the Ministers’ proposals, the Protection of Employment (Uncertain Hours) Bill 2016, while well-intentioned, does not contain any provisions that would address the impacts or unintended consequences of the proposed legislative changes. It is a limited response to the University of Limerick, UL, study and it does not address a number of important issues raised by it. For all of the foregoing reasons, the Government cannot support the Bill. However, the Government will not oppose it so that it may proceed to pre-legislative scrutiny. In the meantime, both Ministers are working to bring forward legislative proposals in this area as expeditiously as possible.