Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I raise the issue of the workers in section 39 organisations who are going on strike this week. A number of workers from the Irish Wheelchair Association, St. Joseph's Foundation and EmployAbility are on strike today in Cork. Tomorrow, workers in the Western Care Association in Mayo, Ability West in Galway and selected community employment schemes in Donegal will be striking. The final group of workers taking part in this wave of strike action will be those employed by Enable Ireland in counties Cork and Kerry.

Here are the stark facts. For 14 years these workers have been denied a pay increase. Interestingly, when Fianna Fáil was in government, it was happy to include these workers in pay cuts, but now, following 14 years of a denial of a pay increase, the Government is unbelievably saying that this has nothing to do with it. That is even though every one of us in this room knows that the only way these workers can get a pay increase is through an increase in grants to the HSE. This is the second set of strikes to take place because of the Government’s refusal to engage with the unions involved, namely, my union, SIPTU, Fórsa and the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation. I have to ask for how much longer will these workers have to go on strike? For how much longer will they be ignored? These are the very workers that the Government was happy to applaud during Covid-19. They are essential workers who do transformative work with people with disabilities, children with disabilities and the most vulnerable people in our society. The Government was happy to applaud them, and now it turns its backs on them. They have been 14 years without a pay increase. That is shameful. There is no excuse for it.

I ask for an urgent debate on this matter. I would like the Deputy Leader to make a clear statement calling on the Government to engage with the trade unions without delay because these workers cannot afford to go on strike. We have the greatest cost-of-living crisis we have seen in decades, and these essential workers, who look after the most vulnerable in our communities, have been denied a pay increase for 14 years. That is a disgrace. I call for an urgent debate on the matter.