Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

We discussed this earlier with respect to how the employer, in making a decision on a flexible working relationship, has the right to consider his or her own needs and the rights of the employee. In doing so, the seasonal nature of a business will no doubt be a significant part of the considerations about the decision to grant flexible working arrangements or not but also how those flexible arrangements operate. Employers who see the importance of this legislation to making themselves attractive to employees will be able to work to design a flexible working arrangement that includes whatever is necessary to get their business, in terms of their business needs, through a particular seasonal variation in work patterns. It may be the case they try it once and the process does not work but subsequent to that, the employee can come back and seek a new arrangement and the seasonal nature of that particular workplace can be reflected. As for an automatic suspension, if the employer has been concerned enough about the impact of the flexible working relationship on their business, an automatic suspension perhaps does not recognise the potential significance of that impact for the employer by allowing a termination in that situation. The legislation also places no restriction on the employee's right to seek a new flexible arrangement. Thus, the legislation allows for the employer to be able to protect the business if there is a particular part of the season where the flexible working arrangement is creating a concern for them, but it also allows a renegotiation of the flexible working arrangement subsequently.