Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

We have spent many hours discussing this Bill, and rightly so given the importance of getting this legislation right. It is important to acknowledge that progress has been made with the Minister of State since amendments were originally tabled.

I will make two points. First, the gap between the Minister of State's amendment and what man of us are looking for with regard to peer support is not great. Second, while I accept what the Minister of State said about delegating the operation of what we are asking for to the forum, anyone who has been around a while knows that if we do not hard-wire into the legislation the precise detail of how the peer support should operate, it will not happen. There is a fundamental imbalance here. There are all sorts of issues with the imbalance between employers and employees. We then have the regulator in the room and then the types of workers we are talking about and all that goes with that in terms of them coming forward with various issues.

It is not overly onerous to provide for a review to be conducted every three years. Senator Buttimer referred to a period of six months. This is not a six-monthly or annual review but a review every three years.

On the independent selection and training of peers, ultimately this comes back to trust. There have been what we would describe as breaches of trust in the past in terms of the regulation and operation of the sector. These have been detailed with regard to some of the previous incidents, including loss of life. There needs to be trust in the set-up and construction of peer support programmes and that they will be independently appointed.

On access to peer support outside one's organisation, this sector is made up of a small number of very large employers. It is the opposite of a sector with a large number of small employers. It may be difficult for licenceholders to seek peer support within their organisation and they will, by necessity, want to go outside their organisation. That should be facilitated.

If any review of peer support is to be effective, it needs to be clearly stipulated in the legislation what the role of the Irish Aviation Authority is in that regard. The amendments provide that the Irish Aviation Authority would direct changes to the peer support programme within various airlines. To say that this should be worked out within the licenceholders’ forum is not good enough.

Senators Craughwell and Doherty have gone into much greater detail than I have but, having listened to all the debates and engaged on Second Stage, I believe there has been progress. There are, however, a small number of very important matters outstanding and the possibility of achieving agreement on them is not insurmountable. We have the basis of good legislation before us if only we could get agreement on what I consider to be a small number of fundamental matters. It would not be overly onerous on the new aviation authority to undertake what has been asked for. I appeal to the Minister of State in that regard.