Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister. This Bill is certainly welcome. It has been spoken about for a long time and, as the Minister acknowledged, much work has been done previously on this topic. It is good to see it introduced here today. As my colleague, Senator Warfield, said, we will be supporting the Bill.

The important role both the trade union movement and the National Women's Council of Ireland have played in championing this issue for many years must be recognised. When I joined SIPTU in the mid-2000s, I remember being told that the gender pay gap was at 17%. Fourteen years later, it is at 14%. If we were not to act now, by a rough calculation, we would be waiting another 70 years to try to get some sort of equality. It is important that we take action now.

The Bill is welcome but it could be better and more ambitious. I agree with Senator Sherlock on that. The Minister might address this on Committee Stage.

I do not understand why there is a distinction between temporary and permanent workers, particularly when one third of workers who are aged 24 or younger are on temporary contracts. That cohort of younger workers will be particularly impacted, unfortunately, by temporary contracts. There should not be a distinction between permanent employees and temporary workers. It is a simple change to make and I urge the Minister to do so. We know, unfortunately, that women take up more temporary contracts than men, just as they take up more part-time jobs than men. That point was very well made by an earlier speaker. It is a simple way to improve the Bill and make it more inclusive. I would welcome a positive engagement on that particular issue.

It would be useful for the Minister to explain why we have to wait three years for companies with 150 employees or fewer. These asks are particularly onerous of companies. This has been spoken about for many years. This will be part of the Minister's legacy after this Government ends and yet the Bill will not effectively be in place for most workers. That does not seem right. I urge the Minister to be a little more ambitious in terms of the timings. Sinn Féin's position is that companies with 20-plus employees should be included. This is not onerous information for small companies to put together. It would mean more workers are included.

I am concerned about the lack of clarity around fines. The points made on publicity are important. Like an earlier speaker, I welcome the fact that Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, hearings will now be in public. It never made sense for them to be held privately. The issue of retrospective payment raised by Senator Seery Kearney is a good point which the Minister should look at as well. One of my concerns is that going to the WRC is quite onerous unless one has a trade union or a member of the legal profession to represent one. Some set of fines would be a much clearer device that could be used, a measure which could be looked at on Committee Stage.

As other Members said, this is just one of a number of items which need to be tackled. It has been a good debate this afternoon because several Members raised the issue of childcare. Childcare is a central issue in this. It makes no sense that we organise childcare on an ad hocbasis. We would not dream of organising national school education on an ad hocbasis, provided by some private or community groups. It has to be State-led. The Government needs to make that move. I welcome the moves in train of, hopefully, setting up an employment order to try to raise terms and conditions. I have acknowledged that previously to the Minister. However, that is only part of the journey. If we are going to tackle the issue of childcare, we need to do what all progressive countries do. The best models are in Scandinavia. We need to develop a State-led childcare system.

We need to see further action on the living wage. Again, we know the lowest paid workers are predominantly women. Again, we need to see further action on that. Above all, we need to see action on collective bargaining. I am disappointed by the Government on this because it seems to have set its face against granting collective bargaining rights, particularly its action in writing to the European Commission to request an EU directive not be binding on collective bargaining. That is a hugely disappointing stance for the Government to take. I urge it to reconsider.

I recognise this Bill is a progressive step. I look forward to Committee Stage.