Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator, but will not be accepting the amendment for a number of reasons. First, it presupposes that there will be people who are outside the agreement but, as I have already said, we hope everyone will be covered by it. Further, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform engages with the Workplace Relations Commission and all of the bodies established under statute, not to mention the fact that an oversight body is included in the agreement. As late as the week before last, the Minister, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, and I met representatives of the public service committee of the trade union movement. The Minister has active engagement on a continuous basis with them. It has to be acknowledged, and I would like to acknowledge it at this stage, that the work the Minister and the officials in the Department have done in the run-up to this agreement, against the backdrop of what was a fairly difficult set of negotiations, proves beyond any doubt, and all political parties since 1987 can take some credit for it, that there is active and ongoing engagement by Government through the departmental councils and the general council as well as the conciliation and arbitration scheme and all the other schemes and machinery of the State, whether industrial relations machinery or otherwise. Some of it is legislated for and some happens on an informal basis. However, there is no attempt by any stretch of the imagination on the part of the those of us in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to do anything other than engage actively and collaboratively with the trade union movement.

Ultimately, the prize has been, is and, it is hoped, will continue to be industrial peace and the unwinding of the FEMPI legislation. I am a former member of the INTO. Although I am not teaching at the moment, if at some stage the electorate decides to return me to that profession, I would hope to renew my membership of the INTO. I hope the general secretary and my colleagues in the teaching profession will have me back. I also hope that it would not be as soon as some people might like.

I appreciate the Senator's sentiments but it is a matter for the unions to maintain their membership and encourage people to join them. The Government is bound by legislation and the Constitution to ensure it engages with members of unions. Nowhere in the legislation does it suggest anything other than continued engagement between Government and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, in the person of the Minister, and the trade unions. The Minister's bona fides are well established given the number of meetings held and the level of interaction he has had and plans to have from January onwards once the Bill is enacted.