Mark Wall (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House, and I look forward to his response to this very important Bill. I put on record the Labour Party's thanks to Senator Sherlock for her considerable work on preparing and bringing forward this Bill.

As has been said, there has been a drop of more than 300 apprenticeship registrations, down from 8,607 in 2021 to 8,286 in 2022. To put it simply, the Government must do better. It is time those considering starting their working lives as apprentices receive fair pay. It is time apprentices receive the minimum wage. I thank the Connect trade union for its work in bringing forward such a proposal and for all the work it does with apprentices. Connect estimates that around 8,000 apprentices earn as little as €6.84 an hour. That is the bottom line regarding where apprentices are in this State at the moment.

The fall in the number of people registering for craft trades in particular is, in my opinion and that of so many others, feeding into the housing crisis. The preliminary census figures tell us that we have 166,000 vacant, derelict and unoccupied homes in this State, which is nothing short of disgraceful in a housing crisis. Every effort must be made to encourage more people to take up apprenticeships, and in particular the craft ones, to assist in reducing this number and making those 166,000 vacant homes into family homes in the quickest possible time.

Since I started talking about the fall-off in the numbers of apprenticeships, I have been contacted by a large number of people who have informed me that they considered taking up an apprenticeship role and wanted to be the next electrician, blocklayer or plumber or the next person in a craft trade. However, when they learned what the first- and second-year rates of pay were, it simply was not an option for them. Many of those young people who I spoke to had gone to college but college was not for them. They looked at trades and at where they would go for employment. However, when they started to look at trades and what the first- and second-year rates of pay were, it simply was not an option because many of them had families and mortgages, and they could not afford to stay in the trade. Unfortunately, that is replicated throughout the country.

Last week, Government launched another €1 billion housing plan. There was little or no mention in the housing plan of the labour and where we were going to get the labour to build those essential homes. Government should be looking at offering a minimum wage to those people who have contacted me and, I am sure, other colleagues in the House to encourage them into these much-needed trades. It takes a number of years to train up, but those initial years are still so important to many contractors in order to get work completed. The contractors I have spoken to say that without those apprentices and assistants, they simply will not get through the level of work they need to do.

I have received a number of comments from people since I started talking about this earlier in the year, and since Senator Sherlock brought it up. I wanted to put on record two of those comments. The first one reads:

Thank you for raising this issue. I could not believe when I opened my wage pack. I rang the owner of the business. I was informed that I was on an apprenticeship rate, and that I was getting something similar for the next three years. I have a child in school. I simply cannot afford to continue in this trade. [They named the trade, which I will not do] I have to give up the job that I was really enjoying.

The second comment tells of a similar experience. It reads:

My experience to date is that I wanted to try a trade, but given the initial wage, I had to reconsider my position. There is no way I could pay my rent and live. I also had to travel to Dublin for training. I know others who have the same experience. Thanks for raising this issue.

I could give the Minister of State more examples, and I am sure other colleagues could do so.

No working person should be paid less than the minimum wage, yet our apprentices, those learning these vital crafts and trades, which help build homes and keep the roofs over our heads, are paid less than the minimum wage. It is no wonder we are in the housing crisis we are in. Our young people are fleeing from apprenticeships, opting to enter proper, paid employment. I look forward to Government's response tonight. This is something that has to change.