The labour inspectorate of my Department is responsible for the enforcement of worker rights set down in a variety of labour legislation and of statutory minimum rates of pay and conditions of employment of workers employed in sectors covered by Employment Regulation Orders (EROs) and registered employment agreements (REAs). The inspectorate is comprised of 11 inspectors, two of whom are job-sharing, who are provided with administrative back-up support by a staff of five officials. The legislation in respect of which the inspectorate has an enforcement function comprises: Employment Agency Act, 1971, Redundancy Payments Acts, 1967-1991, Protection of Young Persons (Employment) Act, 1996, Payment of Wages Act, 1991, Worker Protection (Regular Part-Time Employees) Act, 1991, Protection of Employees (Employers Insolvency) Act, 1984-1991, European Communities (Safeguarding of Employees' Rights on Transfer of Undertakings) Regulations, 1980, Protection of Employment Act, 1997, Organisation of Working Time Act, 1997, Parental Leave Act, 1997.
They have no enforcement function, however, in respect of the Unfair Dismissals Acts, 1977-1993, the Terms of Employment Information Act, 1994, or the Minimum Notice and Terms of Employment Acts, 1973 and 1991, as legal remedy to aggrieved parties in these cases is available via the Employment Appeals Tribunal and-or the Rights Commissioner Service.
Labour law enforcement activity is driven by three factors: by complaints and allegations made against individual employers or sectors of employment by unions or aggrieved employees; by random or spot-check investigation, and by officially-determined policy with resepet to enforcement.
In conducting their work, the inspectors generally operate within normal office hours. Appended to this reply are tables detailing the number of inspections carried out under the above-named worker protection legislation in 1997, totalling 1,671 and in the period January-October 1998, totalling 1,022: approximately 5 per cent of these inspections were generated by complaints received. During the same period the number of inspections carried out under ERO's and REA's was 3,990 in 1997 and 2,802 in 1998 (to 31-10-98).
From time to time and resulting from on-going official reveiw of enforcement policy, and consistent with the resources available to me, individual sectors are identified as appropriate for sustained and intensified investigation by the inspectorate.
