David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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368. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the nature of any contact she has had with a company (details supplied) and the Mandate trade union regarding industrial action involving pre-1996 worker contracts; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10937/17]

Mary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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As we are all aware the issue relates to Tesco workers on legacy contracts (pre 1996). I understand that over a year ago that there were over 1000 such workers in Tesco on these legacy contracts. I further understand that Tesco offered a redundancy package as part of the process in place to resolve the dispute with workers on these legacy contracts and the number of employees now remaining on these contracts is reported to be below 250.

In situations such as this I would always advise and appeal to parties to use the offices of the WRC and the Labour Court and they have done so on this occasion. Both sides have engaged with the Workplace Relations Commission and the Labour Court and considered the proposals and recommendations made. Unfortunately, the matters were not resolved and a strike ensued. Further talks between Mandate and Tesco aimed at resolving the strike also ended without agreement on Friday 17th February and balloting of stores continued during the week beginning February 20th.

On Friday last (February 24th) both sides agreed to talks under the auspices of the Labour Court, which culminated in an agreement that involved Mandate immediately suspending all industrial action and Tesco issuing a statement in which it confirmed it would not make any changes to the pre-1996 terms and conditions while the talks process is ongoing.

In terms of any contact I have had with the parties to this dispute I can confirm that Tesco did write to me setting out their position in relation to this dispute. While my office acknowledged receipt of the correspondence as is normal practice, no further engagement took place.

I hope that you can join with me in encouraging both sides to make every effort to reach a resolution by agreement between the company management and the workers represented by their trade unions with the assistance of the Labour Court.