Mark Wall (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I wish the Minister of State and his future wife, Aideen, the best for Thursday. It is unfortunate that on Sunday the Lilywhites will come between the celebrations but that is the way it has to be. There is no doubt the aims of this Bill can be considered reasonable. The objective is to put in place a small companies administrative rescue process, SCARP, to effectively reduce the number of companies that go into liquidation and instead give them access to an affordable rescue plan. There can be no doubt but that in a Covid-19 Ireland, many companies are struggling and, unfortunately, are struggling to survive. Every effort must always be made to ensure companies, under the pressure of Covid-19-related debts and commitments, have a choice to avail of the new SCARP provided for in this Bill, rather than liquidation.

In the Dáil, our enterprise spokesperson, Deputy Ó Ríordáin raised a number of concerns and issues with the Bill, which I would like to raise once again with the Minister of State. The first is the speed at which the Bill has been brought forward. This Bill is more than 60 pages long and is set to become the bedrock of legislation in this area for the considerable future, if passed. In his contribution in the Dáil, Deputy Ó Ríordáin posed a question as to the compliance of this Bill with European Directive No. 2019/1023.

Directive No. 2019/1023 is, as we know, an alternative to liquidation for companies of all sizes in all European countries, which will reduce the current level of liquidations. This offers the same function as it is hoped will this Bill. We are told the Government has asked for a derogation until 2024 for the implementation of this directive, yet we have before us the ideal opportunity to implement legislation that would comply. It would seem the question remains as to why the Government will not make this legislation compliant and I ask the Minister of State to address this important point. As was said in the Dáil last week, surely it would be far safer and more effective to make this Bill before us now compliant, rather than try to make amendments at some future date.

Given the recent events throughout various sectors of Irish industry, which have already been referenced by colleagues, I have to raise my concern as to how this Bill, if passed, will treat workers. My colleague submitted a number of amendments that were not accepted in our attempt to address what we see as some flaws in this legislation. Those concerns remain and given the time afforded to this Bill, those concerns remain for the workers.

As mentioned in the Dáil, the legislation, unlike similar legislation in New Zealand, does not offer enough protection for workers. This Bill does not offer the protection, unlike that passed in New Zealand in which workers are excluded as a protected class of creditor. Under section 558N, any equality claim should be excluded from the court's power to stay proceedings and under section 558L unpaid awards to workers should be excluded from write-down without the need for a worker to actively assert that right as a creditor.

There must be a fear for some sectors of Irish industry in which workers are unrepresented by a union that workers' rights, without the explicit protection of a unique class of creditor, could be subject to some exploitation. There may be a situation in which workers' terms and conditions could be attacked or undermined as part of the offence of owners' contracts, as was threatened in a recent dispute. I want to raise again the time afforded to the Bill. We obviously accept the situation we are in, especially those businesses, as I have already outlined, but speed can often lead to more problems than anticipated and we hope this is not the case.

As we said in the Dáil, we wish we could give unqualified support for the Bill. There can be no doubt cheaper and easier access to a rescue plan would always be preferable to liquidation but in light of the issues I have once again raised with the Minister of State, we worry there may be flaws and it may be the workers who will end up being exploited most if these flaws are not addressed. I thank the Minister of State once again for joining us today and look forward to his replies.