Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity)
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613. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the number of Workplace Relations Commission personnel assigned to working on the fishing fleet; and the number of inspections of relevant vessels containing or suspected of containing non EU migrant fishing crew documented or undocumented by the Commission since the atypical scheme for non EU migrant fishing crew was established. [54498/17]

Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity)
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614. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the number of enforcement actions and the total monetary awards by category, for example, unpaid wages, unpaid holiday pay, damages, pay in lieu of notice, non-observance of minimum wage and other infringements by the Workplace Relations Commission in favour of migrant fishing workers documented or undocumented since the atypical scheme for non EU migrant fishing crew was established. [54501/17]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 613 and 614 together.

While the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine has lead policy responsibility for the fishing sector, the atypical work permission scheme referred to by the deputy is administered by the Department of Justice and Equality and the Irish National Immigration Service (INIS) on behalf of that Department.

The Deputy should be aware that a number of Departments and State agencies are involved in the monitoring and enforcement of the scheme.  These include An Garda Síochána, Bord Iascaigh Mhara, INIS, the Marine Survey Office of the Department of Tourism, Transport and Sport, the Naval Service, the Health and Safety Authority (HSA), the Revenue Commissioners, the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority, the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

My Department is responsible for the activities of the WRC and the HSA. The WRC’s responsibilities relate to the enforcement of the Employment Permits Acts and employment rights legislation generally, including minimum wage legislation. The HSA is the enforcement agency under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005 and conducts inspections under health and safety legislation at all places of work, including fishing vessels while docked in harbour.  It does not carry out inspections of fishing vessels at sea even when operating within Irish territorial waters.

The Marine Survey Office under the aegis of the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport has lead responsibility for fishing vessel safety, security and living and working conditions. It is responsible for enforcing legislation in this context for seafarers and fishing vessel crew.

In response to the Deputy’s specific enquiries, it is the case that ten WRC inspectors have undergone the relevant safety and survival training and are available for assignment on fisheries inspections and investigations. These inspectors also undertake enforcement operations in other employment sectors and are not, therefore, fully dedicated to work in the fishing sector.

Some 181 vessels on the Irish Fishing Vessel Register come within the scope of the Atypical Worker Permission Scheme for non-EEA Workers, with 174 of these vessels being active or operational at present. To date, 165 of these vessels have been inspected by the WRC. In total, some 240 inspections of these vessels were undertaken by the WRC in the period July, 2016 to 31st December, 2017.

202 contraventions were detected by WRC Inspectors to the end of 2017. Details of these contraventions are set out in the following table:

Some 112 contravention notices have been issued to date by the WRC. These notices advise vessel owners of contraventions detected and of the actions required, within a specified deadline, to effect compliance, including the payment of any unpaid wages arising from contraventions. Failure to respond to the contravention notice and/or to effect compliance may result in the issue of compliance notices and/or fixed payment notices, depending on the nature of the contravention and, ultimately, the initiation of prosecution proceedings. To date, the WRC has secured one successful prosecution while proceedings have been initiated in four other cases.

Current investigations by the WRC have been completed in respect of 95 of the 181 vessels. Five of those cases involved unpaid wages, amounting to almost €6,300. The majority of the unpaid wages related to failure to pay National Minimum Wage rates and/or Public Holiday entitlements.