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

Section 8 inserts a new Part IIA into the Parental Leave Act 1998 to provide a right to request flexible working for parents and carers. The proposed amendments would amend the new section 13B which provides for the range of persons for whom the leave can be taken. Part IIA has been carefully drafted to ensure that the directive is correctly transposed and provides the right to parents and those providing personal care or support for serious medical reasons to persons who fall within a range of family or personal relationships as set out in the directive. It is important to bear in mind that in this section we are transposing EU law into domestic law. We have to be careful regarding the definitions we put in there so that we do not fall out of the confines of the directive.

It is also important to recognise there is a review provision under this legislation. Section 13H provides for a review of the legislation later than two years hence. I will be bringing forward an amendment later on that addresses this. It makes it very clear that broadening to flexible work will be one of the issues that the review provision should look at. I am not in a position to accept this today. I ask the Senator to take note of the amendment that I will be bringing forward later on to ensure that when we do the review within two years that looking at broadening out flexible work to other groups beyond parents and carers, as remote working is currently under the proposed legislation, is one of the things that is explicitly listed there.