Gerald Nash (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his reply. Many of the details he has put on the record are available to the trade union and the staff. I reiterate my appreciation of the efforts made by the staff of the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection to assist workers who find themselves in a dreadful position. They were aware for some time that something was not right in this plant. As I said, efforts were made by the union to engage constructively with key decision-makers in the parent company in the UK. It is right that people are deeply suspicious about the circumstances around this. It is incredibly important for the Unite trade union to be represented at the formal liquidation hearing in the courts on 12 November to make sure there is a robust forensic examination of the relationship between the Dundalk company and its parent company in the UK. I have been told by workers and the trade union involved that some of the activities in the plant in recent months have left them very sceptical about the motivations of this company. In the meantime, there is a human cost. People do not have jobs or social welfare payments. They are wondering whether they should find alternative employment. People have bills to pay and children to feed. We are very close to Christmas.

The larger and wider issue at stake here relates to the point at which employment law and company law interact in this country.Nobody will ever forget the position in which Clerys workers found themselves in June 2015. We swore we would never again allow workers to be thrown on the side of the street without entitlements or security and not knowing what their entitlements were. We would no longer allow companies to use corporate restructuring and fancy footwork to avoid their obligations to employees and get away with this type of activity with absolute impunity. I produced the Duffy Cahill report which proposes some very strong measures, including, for example, to provide for a right to a minimum 30-day period of consultation for workers caught up in insolvencies, regardless of whether the firm was insolvent, and to introduce important sanctions on employers that refuse to comply with their obligations on the 30-day consultation period. Serious sanctions and disincentives need to be levelled at employers who engage in this type of activity. They expect to get away with this scot free and if the law goes unreformed-----