Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister. I want to indicate my personal support for this Bill in substance. Whereas one might instinctively hold back on further regulation of the employment relationship, looking internationally across the western world, both in the United States and in the United Kingdom, the republican value of having a coherent economic community in which there is not a class of the wealthy exploiting the poor is being diminished constantly. One only has to look to what has happened in the United Kingdom, where, for ten years now, there has been virtually no change in the real value of workers' wages at a time when the remuneration of the wealthy, those who are in charge of the banks and so on, seems to be unlimited. One wonders what kind of society thinks it is sustainable to have that increasing divergence between those who are the bottom of the economic heap, who are trying to participate, and those who are at the top of the economic heap, who are trying to become wealthier. One only has to look at the divergence in the US between the group which they refer to as the middle class - a phrase which seems to mean the working class, in our view of the world - such as the people working in Walmart, for instance, and the wealthy, who seem to be pursuing at all costs the idea that their retirement funds and their personal wealth should accumulate at a far faster rate than the capacity of ordinary workers, on whom their wealth is fundamentally dependent.

It seems the casualisation of employment relations is something which is disempowering for the most vulnerable and unorganised employees, and is convenient for those who are in a position to exploit them economically. Although we are now in a far better position than we were a few years ago in terms of employment and we are approaching full employment, which should give workers greater opportunities to earn more and be more justly remunerated than would be the case if there was high unemployment, we are right to do something about the disempowering aspects of casualisation. I support the principle of this legislation.

I want to say two things about the Minister's speech.I looked carefully at the amendment that was inserted as Part 7 on designation of persons as self-employed. I know exactly what Deputy O'Dea was driving at in tabling this amendment and what he was trying to achieve, which is twofold. First, it is to ensure that those who are in de factoemployment actually enjoy de jurerights as an employee; I am fully in favour of that. Second, it is to ensure that those who are in enterprises in competition with each other are not in a position to effectively avoid their employment law, social welfare law and tax law obligations to the detriment of their competitors, and to drive down their costs by exploiting unfair designation of employees as independent contractors.

However, I agree with the Minister. The Long Title makes no mention of Part 7 and the designation offence because obviously it was a late amendment to the Bill.