asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he will consider the introduction of amending legislation to the Holidays (Employees) Act, 1939, to provide for the granting of annual leave with pay to casual workers, such as casual dockers, storehands, etc., who at present are held to be not entitled to such annual leave under the provisions of the said Act.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Holidays (Employees) Act, 1939.
Dockers, carters and other port workers come within the provisions of the Holidays (Employees) Act, 1939, provided they fulfil the conditions as to continuity of employment and the number of hours' work performed for the same employer. The difficulty of bringing casual workers, who have recurring periods of unemployment, within the scope of the Act is, however, obvious. This difficulty is accentuated in the case of casual dockers who are not infrequently employed by different employers on different days in the same week.
As the Deputy is aware, the difficulty created by the discontinuity of employment amongst such workers has not been reduced by the circumstances caused by the present emergency, and for this reason I do not at present consider it practicable to attempt the amending of the Holidays Act. As I intimated on a previous occasion, I am, however, prepared to consider any practical suggestion put forward on behalf of such workers in this matter.
Is the Minister not aware that, in respect of a large body of workers who are employed as casual workers by the same employer, they have fully complied with all the provisions of the Holidays (Employees) Act except for one technicality, namely, that they are paid off at the end of each day and, therefore, it is held, technically, that the employer does not terminate their employment. Surely that situation could be remedied, in view of what the Minister said yesterday, that it is necessary to ensure that the intention of this House is embodied in the original Act could be introduced. If the intention of the House has not been given effect to, thus depriving the workers of a benefit to which they are entitled, surely amending legislation should be introduced?
There is no question of the intention of the Legislature in passing this Act, which was to provide holidays with pay for all workers in continuous employment. I think the difficulty of extending such benefits to casual workers is obvious. I do not think the suggestion which the Deputy put forward would touch more than a small fringe of the problem.
Surely a worker who has worked 2,200 continuous hours comes within the intentions of the Parliament responsible for that particular Act?
I would say so, but clearly the whole problem of applying the Act to casual dockers is much wider than that.
Mr. Larkin
How is it that we could arrange to do this with the casual workers in the building trade? There was no difficulty there. We have shown the employers on more than one occasion how to meet this difficulty. The Deputy who submitted the question mentioned the case of a man with over 2,000 hours of continuous service; a man needs only 1,800 hours to qualify but, in the case of casual workers, they are paid every night. I suggest that advantage is being taken of this Act by the employers.
There are certain conditions prescribed in the Act and a worker who thinks he is entitled to anything can have his rights established in the courts.