Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)
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Question 42: To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation if he will ratify the UN Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and Members of their Families; if he will change the employment permits system to grant permits to workers within designated job categories with the right to freely change employer; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [5880/11]

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The UN Convention to which the Deputy refers comes within the remit of a number of Departments including Justice, Equality and Defence as well as Foreign Affairs and Trade. I understand that Ireland has not signed, nor has it any immediate plans to ratify the UN International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, adopted in December 1990. I understand also that, to date, no EU Member State has ratified this Convention. However the Deputy may wish to put down a separate question on this specific issue to the relevant Minister.

In response to the Deputy's question on the employment permits regime and the right to freely change employer, I would point out that such a change would represent a fundamental policy change in that, a core and crucial element of the current employment permit system is that it is vacancy-driven and job specific. Given the prevailing challenges in the domestic labour market, permits are issued only if the vacancy cannot be filled from within the EEA in respect of highly paid and highly skilled jobs. Prospective employers are required to carry out an extensive and expensive labour market needs test to justify the issue of permits to non-EEA nationals and it would be unfair if, having invested the time and expense involved, shortly after arrival that person were to take up employment with a different employer where no identifiable labour market shortage has been approved.

I believe that the current arrangements for changing employers after the initial 12-month period is, given the employment rights protections that apply, sufficiently flexible. A properly controlled employment permit system requires that permits be issued to a specific employee for a specific job with a specific employer.

Although employment permits are employer and location specific, it is the case that my Department currently makes best efforts to facilitate those who encounter difficult situations and who wish to change employers. In 2010, for instance, almost 1,200 new employment permits were issued in respect of employees changing to new employers. These permit applications were issued without regard to the normal requirements of advertising the position in daily newspapers and with FÁS.

Additionally, where individual instances are brought to the Department's attention, my Department considers such applications sensitively on a case-by-case basis. In such cases, the normal labour market economic needs test is dispensed with. That gives those individuals full and free access to all sectors of the labour market and to all employers. In 2010, a total of 92 such applications for new permits of this nature were received of which 70 were granted.