Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I was very brief in my initial intervention but since others have expanded, I will give the Minister an indication of the areas of my concern on this section and perhaps a couple of actions that may need to be taken, but which may not need to be legislative.

As other Senators have described, this is an area where we are discovering more and more sections that are affected; areas that people might not have expected to be affected by zero-hour or uncertain hours contracts, such as with bogus self-employment. Ryanair pilots have also spoken up to say they are affected. There is a constant expansion in our knowledge of the sectors affected. On Second Stage I spoke of the University of Limerick's research and how it changed our understanding of what was happening around zero-hour contracts versus if-and-when contracts. At that time I indicated my concern that one of the provisions under this Bill is for at least 25% of the hours in which work had been done in a week. I recognise that this band is not new and is from the previous legislation but one can imagine that many working weeks could be 40-hour working weeks and we may be looking at ten or 15 hours in this regard, whichever is less. In the context of this section, will provision be made to know how many workers fall within that 15, ten or eight-hour window that comprises 25% of the normal working hours? This is in order that we establish what is actually happening for those people on the ground. For many years we were told that Ireland does not have zero-hour contracts and that everybody gets 15 hours at least. When I examined the legislation, however, it became clear that many people may in fact be getting a ten hour or an eight-hour payment, depending on what their normal working week might be. Can a provision be made to monitor what is actually happening for people and to see how many persons whose payments are being made under this section are being paid for four, eight, ten, 12 or the ceiling of 15 hours? It is very important to monitor what happens. There was a misperception for a long time, and I have even heard senior journalists talking about Ireland not having zero-hour contracts, to the effect that everybody gets at least 15 hours. That is not the case. I know this is not the case in the legislation.I recognise this is not a new issue, but because it previously took a long time to be addressed, what provision will the Minister make for effectively tracking what is happening in that regard?

My colleague has tabled amendments to the Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018, which will come before us.