Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 12 Oct 2022

Vol. 1027 No. 5

Community and Voluntary Sector Workers: Motion [Private Members]

Deputy Duncan Smith

I move:

That Dáil Éireann:

recognises:

— that until 2008 people employed in the community, voluntary and care sector, such as Section 39 workers, received pay increases under national wage agreements, but have not received pay increases since, and have no formal mechanism for collective pay bargaining;

— the immeasurable contribution of independent non-State agencies in the community and voluntary sector, which provide a range of vital health and personal social services that the State has historically outsourced;

— that these vital public services include Health Service Executive (HSE)-funded Section 39 organisations, Tusla-funded Section 56 organisations, Section 10 homeless services funded indirectly through the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and a broad range of community services like those managed by supervisors of the Community Employment Scheme, Tús and the Rural Social Scheme, where salaries are indirectly funded by the State; and

— that without the continued active participation of these bodies there would be massive deficits in public services across a range of activities, including meeting the healthcare needs of both old and young, and of people with disabilities, provision of child and family services, accommodation and homeless assistance, dealing with substance abuse and suicide prevention, domestic violence supports and working for social inclusion, education and community development across the State;

notes that:

— public sector workers received a pay rise of 3 per cent under Building Momentum - A New Public Service Agreement 2021-2022, with a further 6.5 per cent increase under an extension to that agreement, but no pay rise or improvement in conditions was provided to the community and voluntary sector;

— pay claims have been submitted as part of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions-led "Valuing Care, Valuing Community" campaign supported by the Services Industrial Professional and Technical Union, Fórsa and the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation;

— Fórsa commissioned the report entitled "A New Systemic Funding Model: The voluntary and community sector in the 2020s", written by researcher Brian Harvey, on delivery of health services by Section 39 organisations; and the report found very high annual staff exit rates of up to a third annually, with further reports since of workers leaving to take up direct employment in the public service such as the HSE, due to the pay gap and gulf in terms and conditions;

— during the economic crisis Section 39 bodies were instructed by the HSE to cut the pay of staff in line with pay reductions for public servants, but that these staff were not automatically included in pay restoration agreements and, while there were some pay restoration measures, these were not commensurate with those in the public service; and

— these bodies are funded through a mix of Service Level Agreements and fundraising, but there is no automatic rise in public funding in line with public service pay agreements, and that recent increases to some bodies have been to support service delivery, not improved terms and conditions or pay restoration and parity for staff;

acknowledges:

— that, while these organisations continue to sustain the communities they serve, there is a growing crisis within the sector because its workers, who have endured over a decade without a pay rise, are undervalued and disrespected by the State;

— that the anomalous position of these workers leaves them excluded from public sector negotiations on pay and conditions, and from any other collective bargaining arrangement, and that their vulnerable status has resulted in them being undervalued and underpaid in insecure employment with poor career paths, resulting in a high turnover of staff which adversely impacts on the level of care that can be provided to those in need; and

— the need to establish a renewed relationship between not-for-profit organisations and the State, based on a shared long-term vision and plan that would allow for an integrated approach to service provision supported by adequate funding; and

calls on the Government to:

— mandate the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform to reverse the policy that has resulted in the exclusion of thousands of affected workers from the established norms of the public sector employment framework on the basis of continuing claims that no direct employment relationship exists between those workers and any public body;

— fund pay rises for workers in the community and voluntary sector, in line with recent public sector pay agreements;

— implement these pay rises through the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform by establishing a standing forum and mechanism for collective bargaining on pay and conditions with recognised trade unions in the sector;

— guarantee that Ministers in the relevant line Departments commit to funding increases for organisations they support in order to provide for salary increases;

— ensure that future Service Level Agreements provide for automatic funding increases for salaries in line with public service pay increases and policy; and

— commit to a multiannual funding framework for the sector to provide certainty for providers, their staff, and those who rely on their essential services.

In opening the debate I welcome the workers who have come to Leinster House to view it. We have workers from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation in the Gallery and workers from Fórsa and SIPTU are on their way. They have been the driving force in the valuing care, valuing community campaign in recent years. They have worked hard to build momentum and energy for what they require and what they so desperately need, which is pay justice, pay restoration and pay increases.

The ask of this motion is simple but if delivered it would have a radical impact on the lives of the workers, who perform some of the most vital and important jobs in the State. I am proud to introduce the motion in the name of the Labour Party on behalf of community and voluntary workers throughout Ireland who have been working so hard on this campaign. Before I go into detail on the motion I want to assuage some of the concerns that have been expressed by the Government in recent days. The motion is not a Trojan horse to make community workers public sector workers. Community and voluntary workers do not want this. They want to remain community and voluntary workers. They just want respect. The motion is also not a Trojan horse to make community organisations public sector organisations. The organisations do not want this. They are community organisations. This is their DNA and fabric and they want to remain so. They just want respect and to be valued.

The motion is about finding a mechanism to ensure these workers can bargain for pay. This is a fundamental requirement for any worker in this country and something on which we are falling far behind. The motion boils down to something as dull and technical as a mechanism for pay bargaining. It is something that has been done in other areas. We have seen it in childcare. There are models that can be used for section 39, section 56 and section 10 workers and the community and voluntary sector. We are not trying to reinvent the wheel. We are trying to bring the Government up to where it needs to be, which is to recognise these workers and their serious concerns, and recognise that they need a pay increase having had their pay cut in 2008 with no mechanism to restore it since.

Yesterday the Taoiseach criticised the motion saying it was too broad. This was on Leaders' Questions in response to Deputy Bacik. The ask of the motion is not broad; it is simple. The scope of the motion is broad in terms of the workers it seeks to value and assist because this is the extent to which the workers in these organisations are active in our society. They represent a broad spectrum of work. This includes disability services, addiction services, homelessness services and nursing. The list goes on and on. There are also community employment supervisors. This is where the motion is broad but the Government should not fear it. There is nothing to fear from bringing as many workers as possible into fair pay and proper pay mechanisms. The Government would be rewarded if it did so.

The Government needs to join up the dots on why this is important. This not just about pay. When the Government answers questions on why there is a delay in home care packages being given, it has to join up the dots and ask why we do not have enough home care workers. When members of Government answer questions on why day care services are being paused or unable to get off the ground, they have to ask why there are no day service workers or why the workers are leaving the service. When Government Deputies are answering questions at clinics from service users who say they must continually build new relationships with new care workers, they have to ask why. It fundamentally comes down to the recruitment and retention crisis in the sector, which is underpinned by low pay and the workers having no mechanism to negotiate their way out of it. This is the reality.

We know the HSE is poaching staff from this sector. We know staff are exiting the sector to go to other jobs for better pay. We know they are exiting this country to take up care roles in the NHS or further afield. The Government knows this. In May I attended national demonstrations and spoke to supervisors and workers. I was on the picket line in July with the Irish Wheelchair Association. Several weeks ago I went to Charleville to meet St. Joseph's Foundation with Deputy Sherlock. While the workers are diverse in the jobs they do, they are united in their experience of being undervalued, on the outside and not being listened to. They are united in the fact, as has been said, that they provide work and care for those on the margins and the most vulnerable in society. This is what unites all of these workers. It behoves the Government to pay them the respect they deserve.

If we look at the past week as a microcosm of this debate and campaign, we saw that last Thursday Deputy Bacik asked a question of the Tánaiste on pay increases. The Tánaiste said there is a €100 million block grant that will be paid by the HSE which will cover the pay and that it will be enough to do so. There was a glimmer of hope among the workers. We were contacted and asked whether this was good news. We interrogated it a little further and yesterday Deputy Bacik followed up with a question to the Taoiseach. He said the €100 million was a cost-of-living measure. This is not what the Tánaiste said last week.

Last night in the debate on disability matters, the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, said that as part of budget 2023 "an inflation support fund of €100 million will be made available to support community-based voluntary organisations, including those providing disability services, which are an essential pillar in the provision of health services". She said the fund "is being made available in recognition of the challenges faced by the sector in delivering and maintaining key health and social care services against a backdrop of increased inflationary pressures affecting energy, heating and related costs." This is the truth of what the money is for. There is no doubt the money is needed but it is not for what the Tánaiste led us, the workers and the trade unions, to believe last week, which is that the fund would be part of a mechanism for pay increases and pay restoration. This is an example of the disrespect these workers have been facing for many years, which this campaign is about.

The workers' representatives, their trade unions, cannot even get responses to letters. If they do, the response is to the effect that it is not the respondent's responsibility but that of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, or the Minister for Social Protection, or the Minister for Health and round and round they go, with no answers. They move from Minister to Minister. That has to end. We have had straws in the wind and whispers in these corridors that there is a process coming down the line; we have had no detail. We have tabled this motion to ask for that.

Again, we are not seeking to reinvent the wheel. We just want these workers to have what workers in other sectors have and what these workers deserve. That is why the Labour Party now calls on the Government to commit to a formal process to recognise and to engage with workers in this sector and their trade unions in order to ensure that public sector pay rises are automatically passed on in future to recognise this in service level agreements, and to commit to multi-annual funding to provide certainty for providers, staff and service users. Anyone who talks to the staff, that is, to the workers, will know that this is what it is about for them. It is about ensuring they can continue to provide the service. For the vast majority of the workers, this is vocational. They want to do this and to be in this service. They are not in it to make millions of euro. They are in it to provide care, to be respected, and to have the energy and ability to provide that care and service to the service users. We have had three days of action in the past few months. We have spoken to service users and have not had one complaint from a service user or a family member of a service user about a delay or a stop to a service. The service users fully support this campaign because they know that their caregivers, the workers with whom they interact, are burnt out. They know they are leaving. They know that has an impact on their care. Where would we be without organisations such as the Irish Wheelchair Association, Prosper Fingal and Enable Ireland? The Minister would have a proper collapse in the health service on his hands.

This sector is the bedrock of our health service. When we have patients leaving hospitals and moving to home care packages, they leave the care of HSE-funded employees, who get paid, get their increments and get their pandemic recognition payments. Workers in this sector do not have that. They provide home care packages. There are delays. They work long and hard hours with very little pay. The organisations are struggling to recruit and to retain their staff. That is the essence of this.

The Minister is not opposing the motion, so there will be no set piece vote tonight. We are not interested in set pieces. We want to see action. I hope that in his response the Minister will have something real and tangible to give to us, to the workers and to the representatives in the Gallery, and all across the country. I hope this is not another cynical attempt by the Government just to let something pass through for it to go back into the political abyss and the political ether of these corridors and Government Buildings. I plead with the Minister to give these workers something. We hope there is something in the paper in front of the Minister that will be tangible and will deliver. We do not hold out much hope but we will continue to work on behalf of these workers and all the service users all over the country who rely, day in, day out, on these vital front-line services.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

I am glad to have the opportunity to speak on our Labour Party motion and to second it. Our motion seeks to secure better pay and conditions for those employed in the community, voluntary and care sector, such as section 39, section 56 and section 10 workers. These are thousands of workers who work for independent, non-State agencies to provide vital support services in the community and voluntary sector. I pay tribute to my colleague, Deputy Duncan Smith, our party's health spokesperson, who has proposed the motion so eloquently and put the case for it so clearly. As he said, while there is a good deal of detail in it, it is a simple ask. We are simply seeking a mechanism for pay bargaining on behalf of these workers.

I thank those who work in the community care and voluntary sectors. I welcome those joining us in the Gallery: members of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, SIPTU and Fórsa, many of whom work directly in the sector. I welcome Noeline Blackwell, director of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, who spoke so clearly in the media this week about the issues facing those who provide essential care services and enormous support to the health and care services of this State but who are not given adequate pay and conditions, certainly not pay and conditions commensurate with those for the work done directly by those employed by the HSE. I thank those in the Gallery and those they represent for their service to the State and to the people who live in it, and the many who require their services. They are among the heroes of Irish society, filling the gaps left where the State does not have capacity to provide. It is no exaggeration to say that without their work, many of society's most vulnerable members would be left disconnected from their communities.

We know that many organisations, including those Deputy Duncan Smith named, organisations such as Enable Ireland, the Irish Wheelchair Association, the Rehab Group and many more are lauded and rightly praised as bedrocks of the care and voluntary sector. Their staff provide vital services in communities across the State in supporting those with disabilities, lending their ears to those suffering mental health crises, extending help to people who have lost their homes and giving stability and support to those victimised by sexual or domestic violence.

The question, however, is who is caring for those who care for us, who is providing the necessary value and who is valuing the care workers in our society. Despite being effectively paid from the public purse to deliver a public service, the fact that these workers are in indirect employment arrangements means they are in many cases not given decent pay or the same pay and conditions as other workers. As Deputy Duncan Smith said, this motion and the campaign do not seek to bring such workers directly into the public service; rather, they seek just to recognise adequately the work they do, commensurate with the work done by those directly employed within the public service. We know that, for example, section 39 bodies were required to reduce pay during the economic crisis, but the process of pay restoration has been much slower and patchy. I hasten to add that part of the reason there are such issues today stems from the effort made by voluntary sector organisations to lessen cuts imposed previously. All voluntary organisations reduced salaries previously, but many used mechanisms more appropriate to them than the methods applied in the public sector. Workers across the sector are now at least 9.5% behind public sector comparators on ratification of the review terms of the public sector agreement.

This is not just about direct pay; clearly, it is also about pension coverage, sick pay coverage and contract terms, with fixed-term contracts being more prevalent. We know that significant numbers of individuals are affected by this. We know that the HSE funds an estimated 1,700 agencies through service level arrangements under section 39 of the Health Act 2004. We know that there are other service level arrangements under other sections of that Act, with, again, many more affected there.

As a lifelong trade unionist, I have always maintained that the best way to improve pay and conditions and quality of life for employees is through collective bargaining and the trade union movement. That is our belief as a labour party. I welcome the trade union officials and activists who have joined us in the Gallery. We know that pay claims have been submitted for workers in the care and voluntary sector as part of the ICTU-led Valuing Care, Valuing Community campaign, which my colleague, Deputy Duncan Smith, mentioned. That campaign is supported by SIPTU, Fórsa and the INMO in particular to ensure that staff working through these voluntary bodies will have equivalent pay and conditions to their counterparts employed directly through not just the HSE but also Tusla. Trade union officials have communicated to me and my colleagues their frustration with the challenges which arise for section 10, section 39 and section 56 workers who attempt to organise through trade unions. When it comes to collective bargaining, the sponsoring Department will usually reiterate that it is not the direct employer. Typically, employers may have an inability to pay. The EU directive on collective bargaining and minimum wages will oblige member states to increase collective bargaining thresholds. That may well lead to a significant increase in Ireland's very low collective bargaining percentage threshold. My colleagues and I have welcomed the report in the past week by the high-level group on collective bargaining. We want to see the implementation of its recommendations.

The need to ensure proper valuing of care provided through the care and voluntary sectors has been brought into sharper focus by not just the Covid-19 pandemic but also the acute cost-of-living crisis we now face. So many of the workers who help struggling people are themselves struggling to pay their bills. A constituent of mine who works for an organisation funded under section 39 has told me of their experience, explaining that care workers, who are expected to have a degree in social care or an equivalent qualification, and team leaders, who are required to have a management qualification, are simply very difficult to recruit. Where they are recruited, it is nearly impossible for them to secure 39-hour contracts to sustain themselves. This is therefore not just about hourly pay rates but also about hours of work and treatment at work, treatment which is challenging to contest on behalf of workers because they do not have the same access to the industrial relations mechanisms of the State.

As Deputy Duncan Smith said, the hidden victims of the piecemeal arrangements in place throughout the community and voluntary sector are those who rely on the services provided, that is, service users themselves.

They are really affected by turnover among section 39 workers, which we know from the Harvey report is as much as one third. Churn is high and this denies stability and consistency of service provision to many service users. I will read a few lines sent to me by someone whose support worker is employed by the Irish Wheelchair Association. He calls her Mary. He said:

Mary helps me to live a normal life. [...] Because of Mary and her colleagues, people life me can get that bit of help to stay at home, and we can have a bit of company too. That made all the difference during the pandemic. [...] As far as I’m concerned, she should be paid the highest salary possible. Certainly not less than people who do the same job, but working for the HSE.

That testimony goes to show the difference section 39 workers make in supporting the lives of those who need their services and their care. It is not just assisted living support workers either. As I said, we heard recently on RTÉ radio from Noeline Blackwell of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre. She spoke about the difficulty affecting services such as hers that provide vital public services to support victims and survivors of rape and other sexual offences, but do so in the absence of sustainable multi-annual funding frameworks and assurances as to adequacy of pay for staff.

I was in Cork last Monday and heard from parents of children with autism and other disabilities. Parents organising through Families Unite for Services and Support, FUSS, Cork, told me the difficulties in securing services for their children are often due to the fact that organisations like Enable Ireland simply cannot recruit and retain staff. Among other things, the parents told me the HSE and even the NHS have been approaching staff members of voluntary sector organisations, seeking - understandably - to entice them to work directly for the public sector in this country, and others where workers will have much better pay and clearly much better conditions and security of employment. Of course, the knock-on effect is felt by the parents I met in Cork, whose autistic children are thereby being denied timely and effective access to services. They are faced with long waiting lists because staff are not available to the organisations providing the support on behalf of the State, and of us all.

In the interests of those children and of the many individuals and communities who really need the services provided through voluntary organisations we need to see support from the Government. It must support workers to remain in their jobs and support them to have access to decent pay and conditions. That is what our motion seeks to do and it is a simple and straightforward ask. My colleagues will speak more about the individual provisions contained within our motion and the specific points in it. I hope the Minister will hear our call, and the calls of the trade unions, individual workers, service users and the organisations upon whose help they are reliant. That call is for the Minister and for all the Government because this is a whole-of-government issue. The call is for it to take meaningful steps towards pay restoration, pay increases, and better conditions for workers in the community and voluntary sector. The sector needs sustainable to funding to ensure our communities are truly valued. That is what the Valuing Care, Valuing Community campaign, which we are proud to support, is about and that is what our motion is about. We are glad the Government is not opposing the motion but we hope, as Deputy Duncan Smith said, for a meaningful response that will have a positive impact on the workers, and indeed the service users, we are speaking about today.

Minister for Health (Deputy Stephen Donnelly)

I begin by acknowledging and paying tribute to the vital role community and voluntary organisations play right across the country. I pay tribute to our guests from the community and voluntary sector and acknowledge the extraordinary work they do. The work carried out by these organisations and by the people who work for and make up these organisations has a hugely beneficial impact on so many people. As the Deputies have said, these are very often the most vulnerable people in our society and communities. The services range from mental health services, disability services in my own sector, to bereavement counselling, speech and language therapy services in organisations funded by Tusla, to emergency accommodation services in the housing sector. As Deputy Bacik has said this is a matter for all of Government, as well as the health sector. I thank Deputy Duncan Smith and the Labour Party Deputies for tabling what is a very important motion. The Government will not be opposing it.

From the perspective of my own sector, I commend the extraordinary dedication we have seen of those working in organisations funded under section 39 of the Health Act. We are all familiar with the work they do in all of our own communities, in delivering health and social care services. These include residential, day and ancillary services for people with disabilities, mental health services, palliative care services, addiction services, domestic and sexual violence services and supports for many different groups of patients living with and managing many different conditions. It includes a wide range of community initiatives that improve the quality of life for older people, maintains a sense of community and combats loneliness and isolation. They also provide practical, vital services like meals on wheels, laundry, basic essential repairs and much more.

Under section 39 of the Health Act, the HSE provides financial assistance to organisations providing services similar or ancillary to services the HSE would otherwise be providing. As colleagues will be aware, this arrangement also recognises these section 39 organisations are independently owned and run and the terms and conditions of employment are, as such, a matter for them as independent organisations. The Government is highly appreciative of the vital work of the organisations right across the various sectors, including Tusla and the organisations that fall under section 10 of the Housing Act 1988. On the specialist palliative care services provided by hospices, because of the complex clinical patient care provided, these services are unique within the broad range of section 39 organisations. In this regard I have been engaging with the hospices regarding their specific status.

The Government is acutely aware that while public servants had the provisions in the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, legislation reversed and are due to receive further pay increases under the extension to the public service agreement, Building Momentum, those working in community and voluntary organisations are not covered by these arrangements. Nor are they covered under any public service agreements negotiated between public service unions and the Government. Those working in the community and voluntary sector are not public servants, as we know, so the Government does not have a mandate to change the rates of pay or terms and conditions of employment for these workers. The legal mandate, the legal authority, to do that rests with the employer within the organisations. However, the Government is also acutely aware, as am I as Minister for Health, that as the main and often sole funder of these organisations, the funding levels provided by the Government of course impact on the ability of individual organisations to increase pay and improve conditions for their staff, regardless of the fact they are legally independent organisations.

Today’s motion concerns community and voluntary sector organisations across many different sectors, including health and social care, housing and homelessness, children’s services, and others. However, I have no doubt that the challenges faced by organisations in the health sector, which I am very well aware of and familiar with, are also being felt in these others sectors as well. I appreciate individuals working in the community and voluntary sectors are feeling worried in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis. I am aware of the challenges of many of these organisations when trying to retain and hire staff given their current funding allocations. I am also aware of the challenges many community and voluntary organisations are facing this autumn and winter with spiralling energy costs and increases in other bills as well. I believe the point the Taoiseach was making yesterday on the breadth of the motion is that it covers a very large number of organisations. They range from very small organisations to some very big organisations and service providers. According to the latest publicly available data, the sector has over 32,000 organisations. This includes nearly 3,000 contracted and funded to provide services on behalf of the State. The sector is, as we all know, hugely diverse, complex and the challenges for the different organisations within it are varied.

This is also true of the terms and conditions of staff working in these organisations. The pay of public servants was cut by the FEMPI reductions in 2010. While FEMPI provisions did not technically apply to community and voluntary organisations, savings were made by those organisations. In many cases, this was achieved through pay cuts in line with the FEMPI cuts made to public sector workers' pay. As we are all aware, the issue of restoration of pay for workers whose pay was cut arose a number of years ago. To address this, a process involving the Department of Health, the HSE and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, ICTU, was initiated at the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, in 2019. It was mandated to work through these many complex issues and resulted in funding being made available for pay increases for an initial 50 of the larger agencies that met various criteria from a total of 300 agencies. Subsequently, in 2021, there was further engagement at the WRC. This resulted in funding being made available for pay increases for cohorts of staff in the remaining 250 of the 300 agencies initially identified in 2019. A process along these lines could play a very useful role in providing solutions to the current pay-related issues that have been raised and which are, very understandably, referenced in this motion. The issues have also been raised with me, with Government and with Members of this House by representatives of the community and voluntary sector.

At the same time, there is a need for more immediate financial support in the face of the energy crisis. The Government’s acknowledgement of the challenges faced by the sector in the midst of this cost-of-living crisis is illustrated by the support in last month’s budget. In my own sector, we are providing once-off funding of €100 million. This money will help section 39 organisations, community organisations and nursing homes, as well as certain section 38 organisations. This is once-off funding and will be allocated as quickly as possible to help these organisations with spiralling costs for energy, for transporting patients to hospitals and for many other things. Tusla's funding allocation will increase to €935 million next year. A further €21 million has been secured for homeless services. This will bring the total funding for homeless services next year to €215 million.

I again acknowledge the important work these organisations, and essentially their workers, do. Funding for these sectors of healthcare is at its highest level ever. I know these workers and organisations are using that funding and turning it into vital services for people right across our country. I acknowledge the genuine financial challenges facing many of these organisations because of the energy crisis. We need to proceed with both short-term and longer-term solutions.

Deputy Paul McAuliffe

I thank the Minister for reading his script a little more quickly to allow me to make a very short contribution of just one minute or 30 seconds. Unfortunately, the Business Committee does not allow the majority of Deputies on the backbenches to make contributions in these debates. That is reserved for the Government. However, I will be here for the debate because, as a former Tús supervisor and volunteer on the board of a community crèche, I recognise the work being done here. I commend the Labour Party on bringing forward the motion and I commend SIPTU on its campaign. These organisations emerge because there are often gaps in State services or to give communities a stronger hand in how services are delivered. We must find a mechanism for the State to improve pay and conditions for the people who work in this sector because otherwise we will not retain the talent needed or recruit new staff to continue to deliver services. This work needs to continue in the background. It cannot be deferred or delayed. We need to find a solution as soon as possible.

Deputy Sean Sherlock

I always read the Minister's speech at this point in these proceedings because I believe it is important. In most cases, one comes in here with a pre-prepared speech but it is important to parse the words of the Minister and to seek to interpret them. His speech states:

Government is acutely aware that while public servants had FEMPI reversed and are due to receive further pay rises under the extension to the current Public Service Agreement, Building Momentum, those working in Community and Voluntary organisations are not covered by these arrangements. Nor are they covered under any Public Service Agreements negotiated between public service unions and the Government. Those working in the Community and Voluntary sector are not public servants and so, the Government does not...

There are many nots and nos there. However, one seeks to be positive in interpreting the Minister's words. The speech goes on to say "I believe a process along these lines could play a useful role in providing solutions to the current pay related issues that have been raised, and which are referenced in today’s [Labour] motion." This statement relates to further engagement by the WRC. I hope that the Minister is today sending a signal that there are potentially grounds for a "process", to use the Minister's word, to be devised in which people could come around the table to begin to deal with these anomalies that exist.

In my area in Cork, organisations like Enable Ireland and the St. Joseph's Foundation operate. I was proud to join them in Charleville recently where speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and other professionals are rolling out Government policy. The Government established the children's disability network teams and expects organisations like the St. Joseph's Foundation and Enable Ireland to deliver on that policy. However, they are delivering on that policy with one hand tied behind their backs because there are people working in equivalent grades and professions, that is, speech and language therapists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists and so on, who are working in the HSE and have better terms and conditions. The mandate the Minister talks about can now change. Surely Government policy should demand that, if we are to roll out children's disability network teams and if that is a function of Government policy, the people who are rolling them out should have equal terms and conditions of employment. All we are asking for today is for Government to devise a process to allow trade unions and workers' representatives to come around a table and begin the change we all acknowledge is needed. The mandate needs to change and it is time for it to change so that there will be equality in the system. As I have said, people working as occupational therapists for the St. Joseph's Foundation should have the same terms and conditions as people working in the HSE. It is as simple as that. I am looking the Minister straight in the eye now and I hope that he is smiling because his Government will come up with a process. That is all we are asking for here today. That would give some semblance of hope to the many people we are seeking to represent.

Deputy Aodhán Ó Ríordáin

I will make a brief reference to the success of the Irish team last night in getting into the World Cup. That success was built on a level of trade unionism that stood with those women five years ago when they threatened strike action. That is what the trade union movement does. When it sees injustice in the workplace or anywhere else, it stands beside those affected and seeks to platform that injustice. It is on the shoulders of SIPTU that the Irish team is heading to the World Cup next year. That needs to be acknowledged. I acknowledge the other trade unions represented here this morning as we speak to our motion. The Minister has acknowledged our motion and thanked us for it. We get one motion every six weeks. That is how important the issue of section 39, section 56 and section 10 workers is to us as a party.

I will speak a little bit about the drugs area. With regard to addiction and those working in addiction services, despite hiding behind a promised citizens' assembly on drugs, this Government has been the most absent and uninterested I have ever known when it comes to the drugs crisis. Something was said at the SIPTU briefing yesterday that I thought was very interesting. Section 39 workers do not want to be public servants because those people whom they work with do not trust the State.

If someone is in addiction and powering their way through that scenario, if they find themselves down an alleyway injecting something into themselves or if they find themselves stained and soiled because of the disconnection in their life and the various troubles or difficulties they have had, the last person they are going to engage with is somebody from the State. We need these section 39 workers and agencies. What they are saying to us is that many of the projects they currently have are threatened. It is hard to get people to maintain their work within this sector. It is hard to attract people into the sector. In an environment where drug-taking and the manner of addiction changes all the time, it is hard to start new initiatives because they do not have the security. That security has to come from the Minister and, I would suggest, from the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, whose absence this morning is a disappointment to us in the Labour Party. He is the person with control of the purse strings.

It is often said to us that the Labour Party is trying to nationalise these services or wants all these workers to be public servants. That is not the case. However, we want them to be treated with the same terms and conditions as public servants, including those working with the HSE. It has been said that the HSE is sometimes like an oil tanker and those working in these section 39 organisations are much more nimble and can adapt to situations more quickly. The fundamental issue here is that these workers are not just changing lives; they are saving lives. It undermines the work they do when they are treated so unfairly and not treated with the same basic respect as other workers. How do you attract somebody into the service? How do you change the way of interacting with people who are so in need of a helping hand and of care and compassion? That is something they have never felt from the State because in their lives, the State has at every juncture treated them with a lack of respect. That can come from the school system, the courts system, the Garda or social workers. We all may find this hard to accept but it can come from politicians. That is the day-to-day reality these people are working with. Let us dispense with this myth that we are trying to fundamentally change the structure of these organisations. What we are trying to do is provide that helping hand that shows respect to people who find themselves in addiction and are trying to power their way through this heroic path to a new future. The person helping those people should also be dealt with with respect because respect goes so many different ways. Those are the main points the Labour Party is trying to make.

There are question marks over this €100 million figure that keeps being bandied around the place. It was mentioned on Thursday by the Tánaiste and yesterday by the Taoiseach. It was mentioned by the Minister for Children, Disability, Equality, Integration and Youth during last night's debate on disability, which was brought forward by my colleagues in Sinn Féin, and it was again referred to by the Minister for Health today. That is a cost-of-living €100 million. That is a "keep the lights on" €100 million. It is not to be confused with what these workers are seeking. The Government needs to be much clearer as to what the proposals are for pay parity and basic respect for workers in these sectors. The Labour Party says to those section 39 workers, section 56 workers and section 10 workers that we value what they are doing. We only get time to propose motions once every six weeks. This is how important this issue is to us and we need it to be important to the Minister as well. We thank the trade union movement for its ongoing campaigns. If it was not for these workers, more lives would be lost and that would be on us.

Deputy Mairéad Farrell

Gabhaim buíochas le Páirtí an Lucht Oibre agus leis an Teachta Duncan Smith as an rún seo a chur os comhair na Dála. Tá sé fíorthábhachtach go bhfuil an rún seo á phlé againn inniu. I also thank and commend the trade unions for their representation of these workers. I commend the amazing work of our friends in the community and voluntary sector, some of whom are here with us today. It is essential that we have this debate and this conversation within the Dáil but it should not just end as a conversation. Something must come out of this. I note the Government is not opposing this motion but there is a difference between not opposing something and supporting it.

Every single one of us who lives and works within our communities knows that the community and voluntary sectors are the unsung heroes of so many of our services. That includes our health services but many others as well. Although they are not technically part of the public sector, we are acutely aware that the public sector would not be able to function without them. In many instances they are performing services comparable with those in the public sector and, in some instances, they work closely with those in the public sector but do not enjoy the same pay and conditions. There is an incredible unfairness at the heart of all of this. Many of these workers suffered pay cuts at the time of the financial and economic crisis. The Minister said that FEMPI did not technically apply to community and voluntary organisation but we know that in reality, those pay cuts did apply for many of them. There is no technicality around the restoration of that pay and those conditions. We know how that happened in practice but I often think about how one Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform was able to bring in those pay cuts. We need the current Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform here today to also look at how we can bring in pay restoration for these people and workers, as the economy has got back on its feet, to recognise everything they have done. They have been forced to take industrial action and to fight. They have had to lodge pay claims with the Workplace Relations Commission and they have been asked to do more with less and for less.

I think of the fantastic work that has been done by the likes of the rape crisis centres, Enable Ireland and many others and the real difference they have made in people's lives. They have done this because they are driven by conviction and the desire to make a difference in people's lives. They have made a difference and they know that because families tell them this and we see it ourselves. Unfortunately, this has been met by indifference on the part of the State. That needs to change.

This all comes down to one crucial aspect. Something I have long tried to get my head around since being elected is the relationship between these organisations and the State. I welcome that the Minister is here. As he has recognised, many of these organisations fall under different arms within the Government. There is not a one-stop shop for who exactly everything falls under or which income streams apply to them. The Minister stated that there are at least 83,714 staff in these organisations. I have submitted questions, as have many others, to find out exactly how many people fall within these organisations and exactly where different funding streams come out of. If we actually want to look at this collectively and take this approach to it, we need that kind of information. The Minister says this is the latest data available to him. I would love to see exactly where those data come from and I will submit a follow-up question directly to the Minister's office to see that. This is information that many within Sinn Féin, as well as the trade union sector and other parties, have tried to get.

I wanted to say something specifically to the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform but I will bring that directly to him. It relates to his Civil Service renewal strategy and the establishment of a national data infrastructure. The strategy states that this will "unlock the power of administrative data and improve the lives of the Irish public through evidence informed policies and effective services". When we have a situation like this where we do not actually know how many workers there are within these services, we need to take a serious approach to this and look at that initiative.

Deputy Paul Donnelly

I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this motion. We will not have a community and voluntary sector if the pay and conditions of these workers are not dealt with, similarly to how the public service was dealt with.

As someone who served as a member of a board for many years, I remember how, before 2011, people started off on the same pay. That link was broken and has never been restored. It should be restored.

We talk about funding of €100 million. As the Minister alluded to, that funding is being provided. On further investigation, because people believed this was about pay restoration or pay increases, it turns out the funding is for the cost-of-living crisis for projects and not the workers involved with those projects. The money is for heating and energy. There should be funding for both. Those community projects should not be fighting about whether there should be extra pay for workers or whether they pay the bills and keep the doors open. Two separate payments are required. I listened to Linda Scully yesterday. She spoke about her 22 years of involvement with her project. She has not had a pay rise in 14 years. Name any worker in any sector who has not received a pay rise in 14 years. Linda manages people in community centres, church halls, childcare and sports organisations. I think we all agree that the latter are the backbone of our communities. What I found interesting is that Linda is the employer. Those involved have no say regarding their salaries. That is set by the Government. They have no say over hours. Again, these are set by the Government. What we find astonishing and what any person would find astonishing is that when it comes to increasing wages over a decade, the Government says that this is the responsibility of the voluntary boards, the HSE or Tusla - everybody else except the body that sets all the other conditions.

It is really important that we have pay restoration and pay increases that bring people to the level of the public sector because there is an equalisation here. There are people in the public sector doing exactly the same job as people in the community, voluntary and charitable sector and it is only fair, right and decent that these people are treated in the same way as they were prior to 2008.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

I worked in the community and voluntary sector. This has been going on for way too long. I started working in the community and voluntary sector in 2003. Since then, we have been talking about the same thing that we are discussing now. The Minister stated that those involved are not public servants, but they serve the public so we are splitting hairs. There has been an abdication of responsibility on the part of successive Governments along the way when it comes to taking any kind of responsibility. On one hand, we say we appreciate the work they do but, on the other, no Government, certainly none since I returned to this country, has appreciated the work done by these workers.

We talk about the independent status of the organisations. Again, this is just a way of abdicating any responsibility for it. It has to stop. I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this motion. It has to stop here and now. Some 83,000 people are affected by this. We met them. Deputy Ó Snodaigh brought in a group of community employment supervisors a couple of weeks ago. They had received no pay rise for 14 years. We know who was hit the hardest when austerity arrived. Wider society has been negatively impacted by that.

I ask the Minister to give a commitment that a standing forum will be established, along with a mechanism for collective bargaining on pay and conditions with recognised trade unions. That would solve the problem. We say that the problem is too complex. We have just dealt with a pandemic. We can deal with this. This needs to be dealt with. We are avoiding the inevitable issue - that these workers must be appreciated and have to have a framework. They must have automatic salary increases. They cannot be going cap in hand every year asking "Please can I have some more?" Fourteen years without a pay rise speaks to exactly how much we appreciate the work these people do. They do it right across Mayo and all other counties. They permeate every part of our community and homes in some cases. It has to stop and it is within the power of the Minister and the Government to stop it.

Deputy Mark Ward

I also thank the Labour Party for the opportunity to speak on this really important issue. Last week, I was a member of the Sinn Féin team that met community employment supervisors in Leinster House. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments have refused to give any pay increases to these workers for the past 14 years. The starting rate of pay for an assistant community employment supervisor is €11.01, which works out at less than the proposed minimum wage. You think of the crucial roles these workers play in our community. My constituency office is in a local unemployment and training centre and many of the staff are community employment workers. I am a former community employment worker. In 2009, I was out of work for the first time after being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I got a start as a community employment worker in a local addiction centre. My community employment supervisor encouraged me to enter third level education. I did so and eventually got a degree in addiction and counselling and went on to manage addiction centres over the years. I have no doubt that without the vital intervention I received from the community employment supervisor, I would not be a Deputy representing the people of Dublin Mid-West. I am calling on the Government to resolve this matter and to give community employment supervisors the pay increase they deserve.

I also want to mention youth workers. Ronanstown Youth Service plays an invaluable role in my community. It often holds children as statutory services such as child and adult mental health services, the HSE and other statutory bodies are not meeting children’s needs. Youth workers receive referrals from gardaí, the HSE and social workers but are not recognised in the same way when it comes to working terms and conditions. Youth workers were at the forefront during the pandemic, engaging with young people who had lost all their normal structures like schools, sports clubs and everything else that went with just being a young person. During the bust, youth workers received a 10% reduction in funding, and, 13 years later, they have not fully recovered this deficit. Youth workers are way behind other sectors when it comes to pay increases. They are just looking for parity and a professional recognition of their vocation. Youth workers go above and beyond the call of duty in the care they give our young people and failing to invest in youth workers is failing to invest in our future generations.

Deputy Thomas Gould

I congratulate the Ireland women's soccer team on its fabulous victory last night and on qualifying for the World Cup. I particularly congratulate Denise O'Sullivan from Knocknaheeny in my community. The whole country is very proud of all of them.

This is a vital motion and I thank the Labour Party for bringing it forward. What I do not want is for the Government to support it and then send it off to motion heaven where nothing will happen. The buck stops with the Minister and Government to finally look after these workers, who have been without a pay increase for 14 years.

According to the CSO, €100 worth of shopping in 2008 would now cost €115. The average rent in 2008 in Cork was €1,003. According to Daft, that is now €1,670, which is an increase of over €8,000 a year. We are talking about people paying well over €10,000 extra a year for the same standard of living today. Many of the workers who come under this motion have seen no increases in their pay. These are front-line workers. They are drugs workers, youth workers, community employment workers, mental health workers and people working with people with disabilities. These are people who are changing lives every single day. Many of them worked through the pandemic - changing roles and supporting people where we really needed them.

We see huge levels of staff burnout and staff turnover because of low pay and overwork. The treatment of community and voluntary sector workers by successive Governments has been shameful. I pay special recognition to those working in the community addiction sector who are not only facing unchanged pay. Fine Gael decimated their core funding and have still not restored it to pre-austerity levels so not alone are they not getting the pay they need, they are not getting the support they need. This Government has to recognise that and recognise these workers once and for all.

Deputy Louise O'Reilly

I join with others in congratulating the Ireland women's soccer team. Very clearly, they have come an awful long way in the past five years since their meeting in Liberty Hall. It is a testament to the value of trade union action and collective action, which speaks to the heart of this motion.

I thank the Deputies for bringing it forward and giving us the opportunity to have this important debate.

The people working in homeless services, health and social care services and child and family services, though the Minister says they are not public servants, are providing a service to the public on behalf of the State. Just because it is via a service level agreement does not mean it is not a public service. Technically, they are not public servants but many of them had their pay cut when public servants had their pay cut. When the funding was reduced, the cuts involved were passed on to these workers.

The Deputies bringing forward the motion will not be unaware of their role in that. I am glad we have the opportunity to interrogate it because at the time when the cuts were being passed on, I was representing those workers in some instances. I welcome the men and women in the Gallery and anyone listening. When we went to the Labour Court and did exactly as the Minister said by saying we were not public servants, we were sitting across the table from people who could not make a decision. The fact the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform is not here is illustrative of that. You take your case to the court and have two thirds of the decision-making team sitting there. It is a tactic and it was done repeatedly. The people in the room might offer all the tea and sympathy in the world. The Minister gave it: they do great work; pat on the back - all of that. When it comes to fronting up with money to resolve this or a process by which their rights can be vindicated, that is wholly absent. They end up with a situation whereby they are sitting in a room and half the time the employer is agreeing with them and saying that if he or she had the shekels, he or she would definitely provide a pay increase. The employer is nearly making the case for you to the chairperson of the court or the adjudicator. They are saying they cannot keep staff and are haemorrhaging staff to the public service because they cannot keep pace and the funding is not keeping pace because those cuts were passed on to workers.

It is unfair, as I am sure the Minister will acknowledge and as the Deputies bringing forward the motion are not unaware, on the one hand to say:

We'll consider you as public servants some of the time and we'll hold you to a high standard - and rightly so - and a similar standard to the rest of the public service - and rightly so - but when it comes to pay restoration, well, you're not technically public servants, lads, so, you know, we're terrible sorry but there's nothing we can do.

That is unfair. I welcome the mention in the motion of a process by which these workers can negotiate because there is nothing more frustrating than being an active trade union member. I have said on the floor of the Dáil many times that the best way to secure decent treatment and fair wages at work is to join and be active in a union. These people do that. They are active trade union members but when they go to what should be a negotiating forum, they sit across the table from two thirds of a team. Maybe the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform is there and the employer is there, but the Department of Health is not there; or maybe the Department of Health and the employer are there, but the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform is not. They need a proper forum to negotiate their terms and conditions. What has happened them until now is not fair.

The cuts were passed on and some of them were given an awful choice in 2012 or 2013 when they were told their funding would be cut. The employer was looking at me and saying that the other option was to cut services to people. Will the Minister cast his mind back? It was slash-and-burn austerity all over the place. The people who depend on the services delivered by these men and women were at the business end of that austerity. Employers were faced with the choice of cutting pay, cutting hours or cutting services. No wonder they cannot compete with the public service. They are losing personnel day after day. It is not fair.

I welcome the motion. It is not good enough that the Minister will say he will not oppose it. He should support it, actively engage with that forum and give these people a chance to vindicate their rights at work.

Deputy Holly Cairns

I too welcome the motion. Successive Governments have outsourced and undervalued health and social care work. Some of the most important State services around supporting vulnerable people, care for older people, addiction services, specialised health interventions and disability services are provided by dedicated and severely underpaid workers. Organisations such as CoAction and EmployAbility in west Cork fall into this category, as do other community care groups, homeless services and community employment, CE, schemes. These workers provide essential services. They do it because they are committed to helping other people and making Ireland a better place. For their efforts and diligence they are treated disgracefully. They are paid less than other professionals doing the same and comparable work in other organisations and State bodies and do not have pension entitlements. Not only have these workers been paid less for years, but they will be worse off in their old age.

This approach is leaving the sector in crisis. Community and voluntary organisations are experiencing an escalating crisis in staffing. Service delivery is being jeopardised as a result of challenges around staff recruitment and retention. This is mainly due to the disparity in pay and conditions between organisation staff and their public sector counterparts.

In our alternative budget, the Social Democrats called for an increase in the allocation across services budgets for section 39 organisations, Tusla-funded section 56 organisations and section 10 homeless services of a total of €80 million as a first step to addressing this disparity. Instead of investing in this sector and recognising highly skilled professions and the thousands of vulnerable people who benefit from their care, the Government went ahead with tax cuts and payments for the wealthier. In a budget of €11 billion, the Government chose not to address this major issue. Each Minister and Government backbencher understands the issue, yet it was not important enough to resolve, again showing where the Government's priorities are.

The Fórsa report, A New Systematic Funding Model, highlights that during the austerity era - that is the Fianna Fáil-Green Party and Fine Gael-Labour Governments - funding for the voluntary and community sector was slashed by between 35% and 45% and its staffing by 31%, with funding lines permanently flatlined at much lower levels. Not only are staff underpaid, the whole sector is vastly underfunded. The system is failing service users and workers and the Government has clearly shown it has no intention of resolving these issues.

This is a system designed by civil servants and facilitated by Ministers more concerned with balance sheets than caring for some of the most vulnerable people in our society. The services are provided by separate bodies, which reduces the responsibility of the Minister, Government, HSE, Tusla and local authorities. It costs less because the Government continues to underpay them.

When you stop and look at the situation, it is truly appalling. It shows how this and previous Governments view those workers and the services they provide. There will be supportive words said today, as always from Ministers and Government Deputies but, like clapping for healthcare workers during Covid, praise from Ministers will not pay bills.

Discussions on this issue have reduced workers rights and essential services to euphemisms. Section 39 organisations, section 56 organisations and section 10 homeless services are referred to as if they were abstract matters. This system was an intentional structure established and perpetuated by Governments. Section 39 organisations were created under the 2004 Health Act, introduced by the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government, with the help of their supporters on the Independent benches. The then Minister for Health and Children, Mary Harney, who had just taken over the position from the current Taoiseach, was responsible for the Act's introduction. Section 56 organisations were created under the Child and Family Agency Act 2013 brought in by the Fine Gael-Labour Government. That Act was introduced by the then Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Frances Fitzgerald. Section 10 homeless services were created under the Housing Act 1988. This was brought forward by the then Minister for the Environment, Pádraig Flynn, who was a member of a minority Fianna Fáil Government. Each of these Acts, introduced by parties represented here today - including some of the Deputies who supported them - enabled the creation of the structural inequality that lies at the heart of this issue.

When we are discussing the disgraceful treatment of highly skilled and dedicated professionals in the community and voluntary sector, we have to be honest. The problems started in this Chamber. Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Progressive Democrats and Labour Governments established these systems and allowed glaring and disgraceful disparity to continue.

Any Deputy or party that claims to be serious about addressing the intentional shameful treatment of these workers and the services they provide must address the root cause of the issue.

Today’s motion, which will be ignored by the Government, draws welcome attention to the symptoms of a much larger problem which ultimately will need legislative changes to the primary Acts to guarantee the fair treatment of workers. The specific actions outlined in the motion are important steps to remedying the situation. The pay inequity needs to be resolved immediately and back-dated and there must be mechanisms for collective bargaining pay and conditions.

This motion also highlights the case of supervisors and workers in the community employment scheme, Tús and the rural social scheme. I have repeatedly raised the poor treatment of these workers. They are vital in supporting many rural and community organisations. Community halls, Tidy Towns, sports clubs and charity shops all have gained from the programme. It is also another form of outsourcing as functions formerly fulfilled by state bodies and local authorities are being carried out by these workers, or roles which in other jurisdictions are permanent pensionable jobs are being carried out by people for a small top up on social welfare rates.

Despite the great impact of these schemes providing unemployed people with skills and experience and offering services and assistance to communities and non-profit organisations, the workers are poorly remunerated and are too often met with restrictions and bureaucratic barriers.

In the budget, the Government announced a top-up payment to participants in the CE, Tús and rural social scheme of €5 to €25 per week. The Social Democrats in our alternative budget proposed to increase the top-up to €100 per week for participants of the rural social scheme and to reinstate the community employment, CE, scheme budget to €500 per participant, currently €325, per annum. The Government and the Department have to recognise that the cost of the programme is vastly outweighed by its impact on the ground.

All of this comes down to how we as a society see and value social and community work. The professionals in this area do incredible work often in extremely challenging contexts. Their pay and conditions in no way reflect this and, unfortunately, it has been a policy by many of the political parties in the Dáil to enable this approach. All these workers deserve proper pay. All these services need to be properly funded. Regrettably, the Government’s budget has shown that these urgent reforms will not be happening anytime soon.

Deputy Mick Barry

The cost of living crisis is bearing down hard on working people. The pay increase in the public sector is less than the rate of inflation. It constitutes a de facto pay cut. The increase in the national minimum wage due in January is also below the rate of inflation and also constitutes a de facto pay cut. But the situation is worse again for the nation's community and voluntary workers in section 39, section 56, section 10, homeless services and others.

The majority of these workers have not had a pay increase now in 14 years. Despite the fact that some of these workers transferred recently to the Department with responsibility for equality, there is anything but equality when determining how they are paid. Despite the fact that many of them do the very same work as section 38 HSE workers, they are paid less, are not entitled to public sector pay increases, and so on. These workers provide vital services in our communities such as those to people with mental health pressures, those with disabilities, community employment etc. yet the unjust pay mechanism for these workers is now undermining the services as workers are forced to look elsewhere for jobs which provide a decent pay packet for their family households in a cost of living crisis, and as the organisations that directly employ them struggle to recruit new staff when conditions on pay are so low. So when these workers strike, they strike not only for justified pay increases, but to defend the services that they have devoted years of service to. On the last strike day, the Irish Examiner quoted the words of Gerald Madigan. Gerald is a social care worker for people with disabilities at the St. Joseph's foundation in Charleville, County Cork. Gerald said that they did not want to go on strike again but that they would have to if a pay linkage with the HSE on section 48 workers was not formed. His words show the determination of these workers. This issue is clearly not just going to go away. Enough is enough. The State should reinstate the pay link and increase the pay of these vital workers providing vital services in our communities and they should do it now.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I thank the Labour Party for putting forward this important motion and most of all I commend workers in the community and voluntary sector, both for this campaign and for the absolutely vital work they do for our entire society and, most often, for vulnerable people, for communities and disadvantaged communities, for young people and for people with disabilities. They are in many cases, the glue that keeps whole parts of our society together and yet the Government treats them as second class citizens. It is treating the workers who provide these services as second class citizens and it is treating the service users as second class citizens. That is the reality of this. There is simply no justification for the unequal treatment of these workers and the people who use these services.

It does show a certain contempt. There is no other way to look at it. Of course it is linked to the outsourcing of vital health, community and social services which is endemic in our entire system. It leads to fragmentation and a situation where the Government can pass the buck because it does not have to take direct responsibility for either employees or for the vital community and social services, and so on, that these workers provide. It is really an apartheid in the treatment of certain types of community and public services of incredibly dedicated workers. God knows how any of them sustain themselves in a situation where they have not had pay raises for up to 14 years. They have been crucified like everybody else with the cost of living crisis and, indeed, the housing crisis that is hammering our society generally, but they are suffering disproportionately. While, as Deputy Barry said, public sector workers are getting some pay increases, which are not even enough to keep pace with the rocketing cost of inflation of energy prices, house prices and so on, these workers have been left without any pay increases. Seriously, how does the Government expect people to sustain that situation? This has to end. The Government should accept the principle that is being put forward in this motion. These workers should be paid the same as other public sector workers and get the same pay increases as other public sector workers. More generally, the services they provide for communities, for the vulnerable in society, for young people, for people with addiction issues, and so on, need to be seen and treated as equal to all the other public services for which the Government takes direct responsibility. The lack of respect and frankly the contempt that has been shown to these workers and their service users has to end.

I commend the workers for that campaign. I have no doubt they will continue it. They can be assured of our continued support. It is long past time that the Government recognised their case and conceded the demands that they are making.

Deputy Verona Murphy

I thank the Labour Party for bringing this motion forward. I welcome the opportunity to shine a light on the great work being done by those who work in our community sectors and to support them in their quest for a pay rise.

I recently received correspondence from Maire Jackman who works alongside Darren Nolan. They run a large community employment scheme in south County Wexford. There are 40 participants and it covers: Wexford town, Clongeen, Foulksmills, Fethard-on-Sea, Duncannon, Campile, St. Leonard's, Ballymitty, Wellingtonbridge, Ballykelly, Whitechurch, Dunbrody, New Ross and Tintern Abbey. This is much of south County Wexford. Participants vary in age, ability and experience. In addition to supporting participants in their work, the supervisors also take on roles including an element of counselling and the provision of psychological supports to those on the scheme who may be facing certain challenges. The participants on the schemes work in a variety of areas, such as childcare, caretaking, boatbuilding, administration, environmental work, pitch maintenance, trail maintenance and in administration for the Wexford Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, WSPCA. The role of the supervisor and the assistant supervisor varies from counselling, training and development, all human resource activity, health and safety, payroll preparation, Revenue returns, strategic management, procurement, budget planning and all financial activities.

In essence, they run all the aspects of a small-to-medium business on a very small budget. To quote directly, the email stated:

We do suffer from burn out but have no option but to keep going. Supervisors right across the country have to deal with some very serious situations in their working life. Many just give up as they burn out.

Our pay certainly does not reflect the level and depth of responsibility we have. We have not had a pay rise since 2009 so we are well below the level of pay we should have. Our workload has at the very least doubled. Any additional work was implemented unilaterally by the DSP and we have had no say and no training in any new processes and procedures and any feedback we give is falling on deaf ears.

The crux of the problem it seems when it comes to pay levels for these supervisors is highlighted in the next paragraph of the correspondence:

when any of our issues are raised in the Dail, the stock answer given is that the departments are not our employers, however they dictate every aspect of the work and use this line so that they do not have to give us any support in terms of pension or pay rises in line with inflation.

The buck passing is unfair from Government because it dictates almost every aspect of how these schemes are run and it is just using a technicality to avoid taking responsibility for supervisors' pay. It dictates the policies that should be implemented. It asks community schemes to do work that Departments should be funding more adequately, such as childcare, village work and drug rehabilitation, to mention but a few. The sponsors of these schemes are ordinary people who volunteer to run them but who have no access to funding other than from the Government. They are all fulfilling an important role on behalf of the Government. If the work was not done, then childcare would fail, villages would be in disrepair and drug rehabilitation schemes would close. The fantastic Helen Blake boatbuilding project would not run, Tintern Abbey's walking trails would not be developed and the WSPCA could not offer the services it can currently.

In light of this and what has been outlined, I hope the Government will not ignore the issue and pass the buck this time. It has agreed with this motion and to accept it, but I hope it will also take an active part in implementing it.

Deputy Seán Canney

I listened to the opening remarks of the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, and one thing missing was that at this stage people working in the community services do not need more platitudes. They need to be treated with respect and parity. We know what they do. We know what section 39 workers do in Ability West and the Irish Wheelchair Association, IWA, in the constituency I share with the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte. People there were out protesting the week before last to try to highlight the issue they are facing. To add insult to injury, last January it was announced that a bonus of €1,000 would be given to front-line health workers. The people working in Ability West have had no sight of that payment yet, nor have those working in private nursing homes, even though this payment was promised. Something is amiss in this situation and we must get it right.

In addition, if people have been working for the past 14 years without a pay rise, then something is wrong. This is not, however, all about pay rises. It is about engaging with people and treating them as equals so they can engage under the auspices of the Labour Relations Commission with their representatives and reach a situation where all these things can be addressed. What happens is that Departments announce money is going into a fund for something, but this is not dealing with the core issue. In fact, the pay for workers should be removed from the capital costs required to run the services and treated separately. This is fundamental.

I have been involved in many community organisations in my area. Concerning the rural social scheme and the meals-on-wheels scheme, and all these types of schemes, I have seen the actions they undertake and the bonuses they bring to communities. I have seen the way our towns and villages and our community facilities are being maintained. We invested taxpayers' money into these community and sports facilities, and this is all great. Ultimately, however, the people who keep these facilities right and sustainable are these workers and supervisors who manage the whole process. I guarantee one thing, and the Minister of State will understand this point, and it is that the local authorities do not have a pot to pee in, never mind the wherewithal to maintain all these villages. They are relying on these people and these supervisors to keep the countryside the way it is.

We have something that is working well. It is working very well and providing something badly needed. What we are going to do ultimately, though, is to drive these schemes into the ground and ruin this model. Will the local authorities then have the funding to take on what the people in these schemes are doing now? They will not. Will the HSE or the Department of Health have the money to undertake these activities? They will not. This comes back to one thing and that is respect for what people are doing. Platitudes are finished with. We need to think about these schemes completely differently. We must ensure that any money we spend on the pay of people providing these services is not seen as a cost but as an investment in these services.

If we do not put this investment into these schemes, then we are going to lose many more of the key people now working in the services and we will end up with no new recruits joining. They will not touch them with a 40 ft. pole. We will have got rid of them by natural stealth. There is an urgency regarding this matter. It needs to be dealt with now. I keep repeating that what people want is respect. People came to Dublin to talk to us about this issue. These are people who went on the picket lines. They do not want to be doing that. Instead, they want to do what they like doing every day, which is managing the facilities, the community areas, the countryside and looking after people who are vulnerable. I refer to people like those in Ability West and the IWA. Let us get this right for once and for all.

Deputy Mattie McGrath

This is an important motion which has been brought forward by the Labour Party and I compliment it on doing so. I wholeheartedly support the community and voluntary sector. The people working in that sector have not had a wage increase in 14 years. What other section would put up with that? These people are the glue and the building blocks that keep our country together. In many cases, these are voluntary boards. What is the Government doing? As with pyrite and mica, it is devastating these communities because it does not care about them, does not respect them and does not support them. Ní neart go cur le chéile. This is what the Government does not do.

I wish to be a bit parochial and to talk about our community employment scheme in Newcastle. It has been in place since 1996. I pay tribute to the late Alice O'Shea. She was our treasurer until a few months ago. Fuair sí bás at 93. She was still our treasurer then and had a very active mind. She was signing cheques and doing everything for us weekly. I salute the other members of the voluntary board, including Tom Lonergan, the late Martin Lonergan, Liam Kelly and others. We have the supervisor, Sean Byrne. A wide range of skills evident in the three parishes of Ballybacon-Grange, Newcastle and Ballymacarbry in Contae Phort Láirge. I salute the work they do in the community, including with the Tidy Towns, the naíonra, the flourishing one we have in Caisleán Nua, in the community hall and the new extension to the Muintir na Tíre hall, as well as the brilliant work done by Catherine Moran and the participants.

Turning then to the community alert groups who are visiting the elderly, we have a participant, James O'Neill, spearheading the property-marking project throughout the country. This initiative was recently launched in Monaghan, but it is being spearheaded from a small place in Caisleán Nua. We also have Tigh na nDaoine, which is a community house. The national roll-out of the property-marking scheme is taking place from that little village on the River Suir. Tremendous work is being done by the voluntary committee that keeps that organisation afloat.

That is very onerous. The supervisor of the team is Sean Byrne. There is dignity in the work and we have had progression. They have moved on to many other degrees and taken on other projects. Above all, I am aware of the care that they give and the love and passion they have for their job. They love going to work and playing a part. They are being hived off at different ages and it is a battle to retain them. We have had a significant rate of progression. The Airí might listen rather than talking among themselves. The Ministers should have an understanding of what the workers do and support them, not betray them and dismiss them. It is shocking that they are waiting 14 years for a pay increase. Mar fhocal scoir, I thank Michael Ormond, Stephen Burke and Catherine Corbett in the Department of Social Protection. We would not function without them. They are understanding officials and we appreciate that.

Deputy Danny Healy-Rae

First, I thank the Labour Party for tabling this very important motion this morning. As has been noted by many speakers, the section 39 workers in the community and voluntary sector are not being properly paid and they have not received a pay increase for 14 years. We have only to look at this year and the way the cost of living has gone up - it has practically doubled in the past 12 months - to know that these people cannot be expected to keep going with the rate of pay they are getting at present. They do such important work, whether it is in the childcare sector or helping people with mental health problems, in rural social schemes and delivering meals on wheels to elderly people who can no longer make a meal for themselves. This ensures they can stay in their homes for as long as possible without going into a nursing home or hospital. They do such valuable work for all those people.

We thank the workers for the great work they do in all of our communities and for keeping places looking so well, including entrances to towns. Local authorities do not have the funding or operatives to do this kind of work. The workers themselves are glad to be out in the morning and playing a part in their community and leaving the signs of their handiwork on so many parts of our towns and villages. The fruits of their work are to the benefit of all the people who live in these rural places especially. If they were not there, these places would be very shoddy and out of shape. We thank the workers and supervisors. I appeal to the Minister to ensure that the workers are treated the same as every other worker and not to have them waiting for 14 years for a pay rise.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

Absolutely.

Deputy Michael Collins

I was talking to some of my constituents in recent days and they are furious at the rate of pay for CE supervisors, which has not been revised for more than 15 years. The Government and the Dáil are aware of the contribution that these projects make to CE participants and communities throughout Ireland. Generally, a supervisor needs a car to complete his or her work on a daily basis. It is the supervisor's responsibility to ensure the smooth payment of all benefits - fuel and bonus payments - to CE participants weekly. As the Minister is aware, there are more than 19,000 CE participants in the country. The programme offers training and development, which has helped many participants to achieve full-time employment. The management of this also falls into the role of the CE supervisor. Supervisors are funded by a Government grant, which appears to be the only way they can achieve a pay increase. The current Government states that the Government is not the employer. Many supervisors have more than 25 years service, and are deeply hurt that at this stage they do not have Government employment status. It is totally inadequate for this to continue. We have had motion after motion on this issue.

The Minister of State is also a Deputy working on the ground and I am aware that she knows the value of CE supervisors and workers. The same as RSS workers, they need to be looked at in a fair manner.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

Absolutely.

Deputy Michael Collins

Some of them are only getting €20 more a week for working in their local community. I know that myself. In Goleen we have CE workers in community and voluntary organisations, and with the Goleen and District Community Council. We have rural social workers, Tús workers and HSE employees in section 39 organisations, who are providing meals on wheels. These workers are carrying out invaluable work. I give great praise to the supervisors of CE schemes, the rural social scheme and the Tús scheme. I also praise the workers themselves who look after graveyards, meals on wheels, Tidy Towns and community pitches - be it a GAA pitch or a soccer pitch. Whatever task they are given, they beautify their area, in particular the Tidy Towns workers in places like Goleen, Schull, Ballydehob, Skibbereen, Clonakilty, Kinsale, Bantry, Dunmanway, Beara, and Sheep's Head, to mention just a few. These people have done Trojan work, and both the supervisors and workers have been forgotten in the budget. The budget can surely squeeze money out for these supervisors in a way that shows them some bit of respect, and the same for the workers going forward. I appeal to the Minister to work on that so that we do not have to table another motion on the issue in six months' time, more or less saying the same thing. It is not fair. These people have not been treated with the respect they deserve. Without them, we would have very poor communities.

Deputy Marian Harkin

I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this motion regarding the fact that workers in the community and voluntary sector have not had a pay rise for 14 years. When you say it quickly, 14 years slips off the tongue, but that is a very long time. As somebody said at yesterday's briefing on the issue, they are tired asking for equity, justice and a bit of respect, and for an acknowledgement that their work matters. All of us in this Chamber and throughout the country know how much their work matters. There are so many services on which so many people rely right throughout the country, in rural and urban areas, towns, villages and inner cities - in family resource centres, drugs services, Tús, RSS and CE schemes, youth services, LEADER companies, services for children, adults, older people and education services. It is a very long list.

I have only mentioned some of the areas, but these are the kinds of service that form a type of safety net in society. They are the kind of services that all of us as individuals or family members will require at some point in our lives. These services are run by voluntary boards, volunteers who give their time, commitment and energy trying to provide, in conjunction with the State, local services to support local communities. On a regular basis, all of us are approached by groups in our constituency who want to set up these kinds of services to serve the local community. Only the day before yesterday I was approached by some people in Manorhamilton, who are looking to set up a family resource centre in north Leitrim. That is the kind of service that supports families, but it is not coming from the State, it is coming from the local community, from people who are willing to give their energy, time and commitment and to fundraise and work with the State agencies to set up this vitally necessary service that will support their local community. That is what is important here.

The service is one thing, but the workers, those who deliver the services, must be supported and resourced, as they should be. Sometimes I wonder if it is because these services are run by volunteers and voluntary boards which do not cost the State - they are free and there is no extra cost - is perhaps part of the reason that the services are not valued the way they should be. If that is the case, it is unjust and discriminatory.

I spoke to these workers yesterday but I have spoken to representatives in my office many times and met, in Leinster House on many occasions, representatives particularly of section 39 workers. All of them feel passed from Billy to Jack. They know their salaries and hours are set by the Government - their employer has no say in this - yet the Government says it has no responsibility for wage increases. There have been no increases since 2008. One person said yesterday, in what I thought was the best description ever, that they feel like nobody's child. There was the recent sleight of hand - that is all I can call it, although it gives me no joy to do so - of the €100 million we have all been told about, by the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste and last night in the Chamber by the Minister of State, but we need clarity here. It is my understanding, and I ask her to correct me if I am wrong, that this money is largely intended to meet additional costs due to skyrocketing inflation, increased energy costs, and so on. All agencies and organisations need additional resources just to finance their increased day-to-day spending. This money has not, again as far as I know, been specifically earmarked for an increase in workers' pay for section 39, section 56 and section 10 workers. On hearing three times in the past week, from the most senior of politicians, that this money is somehow meant to deal with the issue, when we know it will not bridge the gap, it is no wonder workers who have waited patiently react with anger and disbelief.

The way forward is straightforward: the Government must engage with the unions that represent the workers and agree a mechanism and a way forward that will guarantee these workers receive their long-overdue pay increases. As we are all aware, the directive on collective agreements has to be implemented. Perhaps this would be an excellent way to start implementing that legislation. Crucially, any agreement cannot and must not threaten in any way the viability of these services. We must not pit workers against service users under any circumstances because these services fill the gaps left by the State. They are essential services, and in many cases, they are a lifeline for those on the margins but, as I said earlier, they are not only for them. All of us at some point in our lives, whether ourselves or our families, will use these services because they are for all of society.

The Government has consistently refused to accept any responsibility for pay and conditions in this sector, insisting the State is not the employer. It is washing its hands and that means these workers have had the worst of both worlds. When the Government reduced pay in 2008 during the crash, they paid a price and their pay was reduced but when it comes to pay increases, the Government is basically saying they can take the pain. In fact, it is saying it will see to it that they will take the pain, but that where there is gain, they are not in line for increases and that is just wrong.

Staff retention is a very significant issue, with up to one third of staff leaving annually, which is simply to be expected. These workers are sick of listening to the answer, "No". Let us give them the answer, "Yes". Let us say we will sit down with them, go through the process with the Workplace Relations Commission, take responsibility, and treat them fairly and with respect.

Minister of State at the Department of Health (Deputy Anne Rabbitte)

I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward the motion and using their Private Members' slot, which comes around once every six weeks, to put this on the agenda. I have been finding this Private Member's motion to be one of the more difficult I have dealt with because, if I were in opposition, I would be standing alongside the Deputies and in support of them, as I did many a year. That is why, when the Minister for Health stood here earlier and spoke about the process, I really welcomed that step change and that step forward. It is a very welcome departure on this side of the House. Many Ministers stood here in the past, but we are serious and we believe in that intent.

That is the case from the top down, given last Thursday, the Tánaiste signalled it too, and only yesterday, the Taoiseach signalled it, stating:

That said, the Government will enter a process, as happened in 2019 at the Workplace Relations Commission. We anticipate getting into some process to try to sort this out once and for all.

He then doubled down on that, going on to state, “we need to get into some process to get the issues resolved for these organisations”. There was reference to the Tánaiste's comments earlier, while my colleague the senior Minister spoke about the process earlier during this debate. That is from the highest office in the Department of Health.

Other Departments need to be part of it as well, given many of the Deputies who spoke earlier referred to our community and voluntary workers, not just those within health. There are many more than just us. A total of 84,000 people work in this space and each one of them is valued and respected. In response to Deputy Harkin’s point, I want them to know their work matters. We are dependent on their work and that is why this process needs to begin. The phrase "14 years" slips off the tongue easily but it is far too long not to have proper recognition within a process. When we talk about people in that space, the data show there are 32,841 organisations. The sector includes approximately 2,886 entities and there are 83,714 members of staff, of whom the lion's share work in disability, where more than 27,000 people are section 39 workers.

I acknowledge what Deputy Sherlock said about the creation of the children's disability network teams, CDNTs, in itself, having created an inequality in the staff room, and I want to address that through the process with my colleagues. While the figure of €100 million might be bandied around without enough clarity, that is where the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform supported us in our ask to acknowledge the role and the pressure section 39 workers are under. I acknowledge the fact that €100 million is a once-off measure of funding to address the autumn and winter along with the challenges of energy, food, transport and other challenges within those organisations. If that means it is pay, it will be only once off. They are separate companies. We dispense the money to the HSE and it is up to the companies to ensure these vital services the section 39 organisations provide continue to be sustainable through this difficult juncture we face. That is where the €100 million for the community nursing homes, hospices and disability teams will go, and we welcomed that once-off funding that was given within the budget.

As the Minister outlined earlier, the Government is committed to redesigning the voluntary hospice sector, which provides crucial palliative care and respite services from section 39 to section 38 status. This will help ensure that highly specialised services are more closely integrated with other HSE services. In March 2020, the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, established a cross-departmental strategic workforce advisory group in the home support and nursing home sectors. The group examined issues such as the recruitment, retention, training, pay and conditions and career development of front-line care workers to identify solutions to the challenges being experienced in the home support and nursing home sector.

It is no different to the home support issues I have in the disability sector with the delivery of personal assistant, PA, hours and home supports for persons with disabilities. This group is also engaged with key stakeholders to better understand the workforce challenges people face. Having taken stock of all the evidence, the group is currently finalising a report outlining the key findings and recommendations. Following budget 2023, the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, announced that Tusla's funding allocation will be €935 million in 2023, which is an increase of 4% on 2022. This underlines the Government's commitment to supporting Tusla and its service delivery partners.

In 2021, the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth conducted an Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service spending review into Tusla's residential costs to identify key cost drivers. This review illustrated the agency's dependence on the voluntary sector to provide essential front-line services and the value for money and stability offered by these services.

The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage's role with regard to homelessness is to make sure a framework of policy legislation and funding is provided to ensure housing authorities are in a position to address homelessness at a local level. To that end, a further €21 million has been secured for homeless services to bring that funding up to €215 million.

I have comprehensively addressed where we want the direction of travel to go. We are not opposing the Labour Party motion in any way whatsoever. We want to work with all Members. Everybody in this House has a story and a connection with people who fall into that cohort of 82,000 people. We need to ensure we create that process. As one of our colleagues said, we cannot have motion after motion; it is now time for action. It is time to get that process under way. Let us see with all our partners in this space how we can create the process with a direction of travel and associated timelines. At the end of the day, we want fairness, equity, respect and value. That is what I, along with my colleague, the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, with the support of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath, and the Taoiseach, who made a commitment in the past 24 hours, will deliver. It is time now to engage in the process.

I thank the Labour Party for giving us the opportunity to set out our stall. There is more that we need to bring to the process, however. I have no doubt that the Labour Party will hold us to account, as I will hold my senior Cabinet Ministers to account on that process. I have 27,000 people in the disability sector without whom I cannot operate and on whom I am dependent to deliver health and social care services in all our communities right across the country. I am delighted that with the support of the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Deputy O'Gorman and the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Humphreys, we will have a cross-Government, cross-party solution to this process, and we will deliver that to the 82,000 people on whose behalf the Labour Party has tabled this motion today. It has given us the opportunity to start forward from today.

Deputy Ged Nash

This has been a really welcome and, to a degree, very informative debate. I have no doubt that what the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, said is sincere and genuine, and I have no doubt that the remarks made by the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, are also sincere and genuine. Somebody is missing today, however, and that is the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath. I will return to that particular issue later in my remarks.

It is really welcome that we are having this public debate in our national Parliament about the real-life experience of those who run, manage and operate the services on which we all rely. I was reflecting earlier on my own personal experience this week before attempting to prepare some remarks. My family spent much of Monday morning helping a family member go to a service that is operated by community employment, CE, supervisors and funded by various agencies. I spent most of my day on Monday dealing not with the HSE, the local authority, the Department of Social Protection and so on but with section 39 organisations, some section 56 organisations and other community and voluntary sectors in my community in Drogheda on some very current issues. That is the reality of life for all of us, and the centrality of life for the community and care sector in literally everything we do and the services on which we depend.

I hear what the Minister of State is saying about a process and I will respond to that later. We also need be cautious, however. As Deputy Sherlock said earlier, we parse the remarks made by Ministers in this Chamber, and the Minister of State is to be held to account for the remarks she makes. It is on the public record. Citizens across this country look to the Minister of State for leadership and they will hold her to account on the commitments she makes. To be perfectly frank, the experience in this Chamber over the past week has been confusing. It has created problems.

We heard the Tánaiste in the past week make remarks regarding the famed €100 million that was provided for in the budget whereby some of those resources could be used for pay rises for the care and community sector without passing the responsibility on to the sector itself to make those decisions in a very challenging funding environment. That was directly contradicted by the Taoiseach yesterday. To be fair, it was further clarified by the Minister of State yesterday evening in what that resource is designed for. As Deputy Ó Ríordáin said, it is designed to keep the lights and the heating on in the services on which we all depend, and to keep service users safe, warm, fed and healthy over the next very challenging period. It is a cost-of-living measure.

The Minister of State should, however, ask many of our colleagues in the Gallery today about a cost-of-living crisis. They had been experiencing one themselves before the current crisis emerged. There has been no pay increase since 2008 for far too many of them. There is a divergence between their pay and that enjoyed by comparative workers in the public sector. It has been a permanent cost-of-living crisis for tens of thousands of community and voluntary sector workers across the country.

One of the most egregious problems we have had in this society over the past few years is our treatment of community employment supervisors and rural social scheme, RSS, and Tús supervisors. In 2008, a process was set up and a Labour Court recommendation was made to improve the pay, terms and conditions, pension payments, and so on. It took until recent years to actually resolve that matter. My colleague, Deputy Howlin, the then Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, established a forum in 2013 to address these issues; a process that was ignored by the previous Administration. Some of those issues have now been resolved. I use that example to illustrate a broader point about the official neglect of the community and voluntary sector in this country on which we all depend.

Much disinformation has been bandied around over the past few days by various Ministers about the purpose of this particular motion. We were challenged on the notion of whether the Labour Party wants to see all of these community and voluntary sector services brought into public ownership and managed by the public service and Civil Service. We very much do not, and neither does anybody represented in the Gallery today or the trade unions that represent them. As my colleague, Deputy Ó Ríordáin, said, they are agile, flexible services that are designed to respond to community needs in a way the public service and Civil Service will never do. They generally work really well. Frankly, the Government was being disingenuous in making those claims and giving that impression to the wider public. Those confused messages were problematic and created issues over the past few days. Some of those problems need to be addressed and repaired, quite frankly.

One way, though, of ensuring the State has to take ownership of and responsibility for managing these organisations and the kinds of services they provide is by not paying their staff and not giving adequate sources to the organisations that manage those staff or those services. Ultimately, if it does not, because of the issue of churn in the sector and the loss of staff and retention of skilled staff, the reality is that the responsibility for managing and providing those services, which is being done really well by section 39, section 56, section 10 and other organisations that are operating in our communities across the country, will then fall directly on the State itself. Therefore, the State is arguably being penny wise and pound foolish in how it is responding to these issues. The investment needs to be made now.

We have all been subjected time and time again to the mantra from individual Departments, but especially the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, that there is no direct employment relationship between the organisations and individual workers and the line funding Departments or agencies.

We understand and accept that but I remind the House about the following matter. A precedent was set in a process earlier this year by the visionary work that has been organised by the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth in resourcing the employment regulation order to drive better pay, terms, conditions and retention in the early years sector, using a mechanism re-established by the Labour Party in recent years.

I am pleased to see that the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform has belatedly joined us. We are disappointed that the Minister or one of his colleagues in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform did not take this motion because when I talk about the mantra of repeating the idea that there is no direct employment relationship, that comes from on high. It comes from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and distils its way down to each and every Department. Another Opposition spokesperson made remarks earlier to the effect that you go into a negotiation with a Government agency in the Labour Court, or the WRC previously, and the line Department might decide that it wants to do business with you but the people who are saying they have no direct employment relationship are outside the door with their calculators refusing to do a deal. The reality is there is a relationship and that nonsense and guff needs to be addressed and got over. People need to understand that if a process is to emerge from this, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has a critical role to play, on a cross-Government basis, to ensure that any process that might emerge from today will be taken seriously and operated in good faith by everyone.

The Minister of State mentioned the number of people who are working in the sector and there is a great organisation called Benefacts that we all relied on for up-to-date and real-time information on employment numbers, funding, and so on, for section 39, section 56 and section 10 organisations, and for the community and voluntary sector more generally. It has effectively been closed down by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and we can only manage what we measure. That was a real problem and that is something we are going to regret when it comes to us being in a position to analyse the way forward and propose the best way forward for the community and voluntary sector and the workers therein.

We are a solutions-orientated party and we try to be constructive. We fundamentally believe in the principles of collective bargaining and nobody should be afraid of collective bargaining. I am pleased that the Minister has put on the record his commitment to engaging in a process of sorts. The next step, if we are to develop a process in good faith with the trade unions and employers, is to have a fundamental role for the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in order for that process to succeed. That should involve a commitment on multi-annual funding for organisations to give certainty and security, not just to staff but to service users themselves. There should also be a commitment, through the public procurement process, to have a drive and move forward in pay parity and convergence of the pay of these workers and public servants into the future. The next statement we need to hear from the Government is a commitment from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and the Minister, Deputy Michael McGrath, to move this process on. A phone call should be made today to SIPTU, Fórsa and the INMO to deliver on the commitment made by the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, and reiterated by the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, today that a process would be entered into to address these issues.

Question put and declared carried.