Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to express my condolences to the Fitzpatrick family and especially to my colleague, Senator Fitzpatrick.

Yesterday in Belfast, some food delivery workers from Just Eat, Deliveroo and a number of similar services went on strike. They withdrew their services on the basis of their terms and conditions. They work in what is euphemistically, and supposedly excitingly, called the "gig economy". I have spoken about this on several previous occasions. Companies like Deliveroo decide they will set up a piece of technology and a platform in order that restaurants can access the public and, in theory, that is a really good idea. Back in 2014, we probably all welcomed it as a very good idea. There are consequences of this for people's employment rights, however. People are out working on their bicycles and in their cars, not even getting the minimum wage for the sheer extent of the hours they work. They take risks with their own lives in order to satisfy an accumulative number of deliveries. They have no holiday pay or public holiday pay. They do not get extra time for having worked on the bank holiday last weekend. They do not get any of those things because they are considered by the likes of Deliveroo as self-employed independent contractors. Because a company can put somebody else in instead of those workers on an evening, there is no mutuality of obligation. This undermines any of the protections that come with employment rights and being designated an employee. There is an increase in the pursuit of flexible working and in this gig economy model. The time has come when this House needs to debate the suitability of the employment models in our State. We have a race to the bottom insofar as people's employment status and all the protections that accrue with that, which were fought for very hard over a very long period, are concerned. I ask for a debate on that issue.