I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
The main purpose of this Bill is to provide improved protection for young persons and children by regulating their conditions of employment. In setting the minimum age for entry to employment at 15 years, the Bill sets out to remove an anomaly whereby the existing minimum age for entry to employment is 14 years although the school-leaving age has been raised to 15 years.
For the purpose of the Bill, those in the 15 to 18 age-group are regarded as young persons and those under 15 as children. The term "employee" in the Bill relates to both categories.
This is the first piece of legislation to protect young workers for over 30 years. The effectiveness of this legislation will be monitored closely and in this respect the enforcing inspectorate will have a role and if facts are disclosed that amendments should prove necessary I will not hesitate to introduce these.
It must be acknowledged that the full facts of youth employment in this country are not known. Our statistics do not provide enough detail related to youth. The Bill, when enacted, by compelling employers to maintain records, will furnish for the first time hard facts in place of present surmise. While the worst exploitation of child labour occurred in the 19th century, it would be naïve to think that all traces of the unscrupulous use of the labour of children has disappeared. My Department officers have received complaints about the use of children over long hours for low wages, with the complicity of parents or guardians in many cases. Often, too, the local community do not question, indeed in some instances approve of, young persons working over long hours.
If the worst excesses of exploitation of child labour belong to another century, we must not close our eyes to new forms of exploitation which, superficially, might appear attractive in money terms to young people. I have in mind here the vast expansion and changes which have occurred in the distributive trade leading to the establishment of large supermarkets, off-licences and liquor stores requiring personnel who are not concerned unduly with long hours of work and low hourly payments. Many young people fall into this category.
Generally in our system of employer/employee relations the trade union organisation is expected to provide the organisational shield to safeguard individual and collective rights in the workplace. In the instances I have mentioned, however, trade union organisation has not kept pace with the proliferation of these new distributive forms. I do not wish to suggest that the young people working in these areas are all victims of vicious exploitation but I would indicate that on the facts available, we have received numerous complaints respecting employment conditions in supermarkets, publichouses, catering establishments, petrol service stations and the services industrial sector generally. A large proportion of the young people in such work are girls.
When we consider the question of youth employment, by which I mean all those at work under the age of 18, we find the great class division in our society asserting itself. The children of parents below a certain income depart for unskilled employment trained for no specific purpose and lacking the skills necessary to ensure a future career with security and adequate remuneration. That is why I have been so anxious to expand the national training programme so as to alter this sad scheme of things. Great strides have been made during the past two years in expanding our direct training capacity but the need to be met remains a vast one. The children of the parents I have mentioned in Ireland find little institutional assistance, certainly no assistance commensurate with the effort required to break from the fate ordained for them by virtue of their parents financial and social status. The children of the unskilled remain unskilled. The culturally under-privileged of one generation belong to the same category in the next. It would be a gross underestimation of the size of this problem to suppose that this Bill faces up to these issues. The Bill simply confronts some of the problems posed when young people leave school for industrial or other work, establishing certain minimum conditions which must apply.
Like the rest of us in the consumer society, young people are subject to the same pressures designed to make them addicts of the values of the acquisitive society. They are urged to emulate the mistakes of their elders to become hooked on a gadget-obsessed society. Under the guise of rejecting that society and its values the pop prophets of the consumer-orientated youth culture preach a new set of possessions, the gadgets and props of their alternative order. At any rate it can be said that many young people are coerced into over-spending and in the event are not concerned about the hours they work or the conditions attached provided there is some financial reward.
The enforcing agency will be the inspectorate which during the past year I have increased by an appreciable number. As indicated already, further legislation may be considered in this area when we are in full possession of all the facts since up to now we have not specifically addressed ourselves in legislation in this Parliament to the question of young people at work.
The passage of the Bill should cause us to think once more of the problems of our young people at work in foreign countries either on a permanent basis or during school holidays. While net emigration has virtually ceased in recent years, an alarming proportion of the outflow has constituted a consistent proportion of young people, girls and boys under the age of 18, many from rural parts of this country. While great credit must go to the many voluntary agencies working on questions related to this in England, one is left with the impression that under present arrangements the possibility of great hardships being undergone by young people working for long hours in England is still with us. Even in the case of those who have not left education permanently, one is left with the impression that students, whether at secondary level or university, in their efforts to obtain as large a sum of money as possible during the holiday period are forced to work abnormal hours which must have serious adverse consequences both on their application to study and their health.
I have asked our labour attaché, appointed by me, in London to report on this aspect of the situation. The Committee on Emigrants attached to my Department have also examined it. Outside England in this connection I have had thorough examinations carried out of, for example, on the working conditions of potato-pickers in Scotland and of our trainee hotel workers in Switzerland. Generally, a reform Government must examine all areas of potential improvement. Up to a relatively recent date young people were considered to be cared for adequately if sufficient swimming-pools or recreation areas were provided, not that these have been provided adequately either. While there have been improvements in this area and while this aspect is important, it would be true to say that the requirements of young people at work were not considered.
Our decision to give votes to young people at 18 must lead to a more serious analysis of young people in our society, their needs and how our laws must serve those needs. We live in a country which has more young people living within the State's boundaries than at any other time in the State's history. It is not realised that a revolution in the age composition of our population is taking place. Whether our institutions are facing up to this changing pattern is an open question.
I had been considering proposals for an Hours of Work Act which would have regulated the working hours, rest intervals and other conditions of most employees, irrespective of age. Extensive consultations about those proposals were conducted with employer and employee interests. Due to the diversity of employment patterns throughout various sectors of the economy, many problems arose in trying to reconcile the views of all interests in one piece of general legislation. Since it would take a considerable time to resolve these problems, I became concerned that the implementation of the provisions dealing with the protection of young persons might be further delayed. I felt, therefore, that effect should be given quickly to those parts of the original proposals which deal specifically with the interests of young persons in employment.
This Bill reflects both modern trends in employment conditions and various international standards designed for the protection of young people. The enactment of the Bill will represent a significant innovatory step in this area and will enable three International Labour Organisation Conventions to be ratified by Ireland. These are the conventions relating to night work of young persons both in industrial and in non-industrial occupations and the Minimum Age Convention.
The provisions of the Bill will have very wide application and will cover young persons in almost all forms of employment. Limited exceptions are proposed in respect of a few categories of workers, where the nature of their activities would pose serious problems of application. These are confined to young persons employed as fishermen, lighthouse keepers, seafarers and members of the Defence Forces. I am taking power to bring excluded categories within the scope of the legislation if this appears desirable at a future time.
While statistics do not exist which could be related directly to the scope of the Bill, it has been estimated that roughly 65,000 young employees in the age groups 15 years to 18 years, would be covered by its provisions. Many of these have already had the protection of the relevant provisions of the Conditions of Employment Acts 1936-1944 and the Shops (Conditions of Employment) Acts 1938-1942. However, approximately one third of this total will be brought within the scope of this protective legislation for the first time.
Under section 4 of this Bill, the employment of children under 15 years will be generally prohibited. I recognise that for young people at school some familiarity with the working environment can be an important educational experience. As an exception to the minimum employment age of 15, children of more than 14 years will be allowed to do light non-industrial work for up to two hours a day outside school hours and up to seven hours a day during holidays subject to a maximum of 35 hours per week, provided the work is not harmful to their health or normal development. Neither must it prejudice their attendance or performance at school.
There were suggestions that the employment of children under school-leaving age should be regulated by a licensing arrangement but I believe that this would merely serve to create a cumbersome bureaucratic arrangement which, in the context of my proposals, would relate to but one year's employment between 14 and 15 years. The conditions which will be attached to the employment of children in that age group will act as adequate safeguards.
I have considered it desirable in section 6 to take power to specify a higher minimum age for entry to employment in respect of any work which might endanger the health or safety of young persons. This power, which would only be exercised after consultation with the social partners, gives me a measure of flexibility in dealing with special situations. The provision is in line with the thinking of the International Labour Organisation.
Section 5 requires employers to obtain proper evidence of age before they take children or young persons into employment. They are also required to keep records of ages, working times and rates of pay. These requirements have been strengthened to facilitate enforcement. Contraventions by employers and complicity by parents or guardians will be offences. I expect that the application of this provision will enable me to monitor the conditions of employment of those concerned and should the need arise further corrective measures will be taken.
Sections 7 and 8 deal with maximum working hours for young persons and section 9 covers their normal working hours. The main point to which I would like to draw the attention of Deputies is the more favourable provisions under both headings for young persons under 16 years. I consider that these young people, undertaking their first experience of full-time employment, are deserving of special consideration and these provisions will help to assist in their transition into the working environment. There are provisions in sections 7 and 9 for averaging hours within the over-riding limits in accordance with the terms of collective agreements, employment regulation orders and registered employment agreements but I have not made any such provision in section 8 because it would, in my view, be inappropriate for young persons under 16 years.
Intervals for rest are specified in sections 11 and 12. Following a period of five hours' work, an employee must be allowed an unpaid half-hour's break.
Before commencing overtime expected to last more than 1½ hours, an employee must get an unpaid break of half an hour. This particular break may be varied by agreement provided the revised break is not less than 15 minutes and is paid for. In addition, an employee who works more than five days in a week and more than three hours on a Sunday must be allowed a 24-hour break, without pay, every seven days.
There are restrictions in sections 13 and 14 of the Bill on the employment of children and young persons at night. The enactment of these provisions will enable us to ratify the ILO conventions on night work to which I have referred.
The enforcement of the provisions of this legislation, if passed, would fall to the inspectors of my Department. Section 26 gives them the usual powers for this purpose. Sections 21 to 23 deal with prosecutions and penalties. Read together with sections 5 and 25, which relate to evidence of age and the keeping of records, I think that my intention will be clear that this law should be observed. While I have referred to the formal provisions related to enforcement, I would welcome the co-operation of all sections of the community in ensuring that the very necessary provisions of this Bill will be observed in both the letter and the spirit of the law.
In order to ensure that this legislation, as a flexible instrument of social reform, can be adjusted in accordance with the special requirements of particular sectors of employment, I have taken powers in the Bill to give exemptions by regulations.
This would follow consultations with the appropriate workers' and employers' organisations. I should make it clear that such powers of modification would be used only in cases where I am convinced by the evidence presented that special measures are essential. There is also a requirement in section 27 that drafts of orders in relation to major alterations in the sections which deal with the non-application of the Act, maximum hours and normal hours, must be laid before each House of the Oireachtas with a view to securing their approval by means of affirmative resolution. In this way, it will not be necessary to introduce amending legislation on each occasion when a major change under any of these headings is being made while ensuring at the same time that the Oireachtas retains full control over such changes.
I referred earlier to the wider scope of the Bill as compared with existing legislation. This is a major improvement in itself. In addition, various standards laid down in the Bill have also been improved in favour of the young employee. Compared with the Conditions of Employment Acts, 1936-1944, which cover mainly industrial work, there are changes in relation to minimum age, maximum and normal working hours of young persons under 16 years and in night work restrictions. The changes favourable to employees are more marked when the provisions of the Bill are compared with the Shops (Conditions of Employment) Acts, 1938-1942, covering employees in shops, hotels, restaurants and similar establishments. In this case, the changes relate to minimum age, maximum and normal working hours for all young employees and night work restrictions. It will be noted from section 19 that where hours of work have to be reduced in order to comply with the provisions of the Act, there would be no reduction permitted in the remuneration due to the employee.
Taking the Bill as a whole, the House will, I hope agree that its provisions represent a positive legislative advance in the conditions of employment of children and young persons. It is also a straightforward piece of legislation which will afford flexibility for modifications in appropriate cases. For these reasons I commend the Bill to the House and look forward to the speedy passage of all its Stages.