Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I express my thanks to the staff, the Cathaoirleach and the Leader for their support and co-operation this year.

I want to raise the issue of VAT in the hotel sector, an issue that has been raised by a number of colleagues over the past week. They are calling for the VAT subsidy to be retained. There are two problems with this. The first is that the Irish Hotels Federation continues to resist any moves towards establishing a joint labour committee, which would establish a floor of decency in terms of rates of pay. The second problem is that when representatives of the Irish Hotels Federation appeared before the Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, they said the joint labour committees were not needed because of the minimum wage. Members should think about that. They are declaring as the leaders of the industry that their industry is a minimum wage industry. All of us stay in hotels. How many Senators have noticed that the person who checks them in in the evening is the person who checks them out in the morning and the horrendous hours they must work on precarious contracts and flat rates of pay with no overtime? The head of the Irish Hotels Federation tells us that it is a minimum wage industry that will not engage with organs of the State regarding a joint labour committee. Apart from asking for a debate on this in the autumn, I would say to our colleagues that if they are going to call for the retention of the VAT subsidy, at the very least, they should call for their colleagues in the Irish Hotels Federation to engage with the joint labour committee process and show some decency and respect for the hard-working staff who actually keep our tourism industry going year in and year out.