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Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 9 Mar 1988

Vol. 118 No. 18

Worker Participation (State Enterprises) Bill, 1988: Committee Stage.

Before we take Committee Stage of the Worker Participation (State Enterprises) Bill, 1988, I have circulated for the information of Senators a list of the groupings of the amendments which can be dealt with as we come to them. I also want to bring to the notice of the House an omission from Senator Fennell's amendment No. 9. The words "under the Unfair Dismissals Act, 1977" should appear after the word "lodged" in the first line of the amendment.

Sections 1 to 5, inclusive, agreed to.
SECTION 6.

I move amendment No. 1:

In page 7, lines 27 to 30, to delete paragraph (c) and substitute the following:

"(c) the development, by the specified body and such persons as the agreement may provide, of co-determination in the implementation of Board decisions and the results of industrial relations agreements."

The amendment was put down because we believe that because of the way the section is framed at present the whole concept of determination, which is the final objective of our amendment and of our policy and to a great extent of the intentions of the Minister himself, the whole idea of co-determination could be put back and that it would be a long time before we would come to a realisation of it.

For example, at present under section 4 where we have got an arrangement for consultation, the definition of consultation is simply that you get information, discussion and recommendation. We have people at present who make decisions as directors. If worker directors at present are making, decisions at subsidiary level, those decisions are joint decisions and co-determined. It does not seem to me that the wording of paragraph (c) as it stands at present is sufficient. We put down this amendment to see if we could give more meaning to the whole idea of co-determination and to establish in the minds of the people who are employed in industry or in a service that there is a system of co-operative government, if you like, or co-determination in industry.

As Senator Harte has said, our intention is to delete paragraph (c) of section 6 (2) and replace it with a suggested new paragraph (c). If we read it in the context of the Minister's existing paragraph, it refers to the dissemination of information which is referred to in the previous two paragraphs for the exchange of views and clear and reliable information on a regular basis between the specified body and such persons as the agreement may provide concerning such affairs of the specified body as may be provided in the agreement. We agree with that concept but we feel that the new paragraph we are suggesting would have more relevance when read in the context of the two preceding paragraphs (a) and (b). It might sound technical but it has a relevance for people involved, particularly for worker directors in State companies. In consultation with unions representing that group of workers, we are satisfied that our new paragraph is more in line with the way they are thinking on this matter than that suggested by the parliamentary draftsman. I hope the Minister will concede our point. We do not think it is unreasonable and we would welcome dialogue with the Minister on this stage of the Bill.

I understand the point that is being made. I will repeat what I said on Second Stage. Worker participation is not a universally agreed concept. We are trying to get some kind of consensus. At one extreme people would seek to limit workers involvement in giving employees selective information — I know that is what Senator Harte is saying. At the other end of the spectrum, co-determination is seen as a process for employees and employers together to decide business policy. The provisions of the Bill lie somewhere between those opposite interpretations as I explained on the last occasion. This middle-of-the-road approach is given broad acceptability by management and a employee interests alike in all of our discussions with them.

Section 6 is a pragmatic approach to the diversity of views about the nature of participation, which recognises the common ground among all interests. In this regard it provides a realistic and sound basis for development of worker involvement. That is what we are trying to do in this Bill — to seek consensus, involvement and the co-operation of both sides. I should add that there is nothing restrictive in the Bill. As I explained the last day, it is as open as we can make it. If somebody wished to bring in co-determination he could do that because there is nothing in the Bill which would preclude relevant interests in any of the enterprises, any of the worker directors involved, or any of the State enterprises from concluding arrangements which would encompass co-determination arrangements.

There is a fear in the minds of workers, and I can understand the problem the Minister has in this respect. I do not think it is correct to say that in all circumstances if you have a consultation arrangement it must be on the basis of information, discussion and agreement. I am not suggesting that. I am suggesting that there are boards where worker directors are already co-determining as provided for in the other paragraphs. They are co-determining at the upper level but according to the way this Bill is written it does not look as though they are co-determining. In other words, they are not jointly making decisions. After all, if you are drawing up an agreement on worker participation, which the Bill will call for, the existing worker directors I presume will be part of the process of negotiating that agreement and will have an input into it and will probably participate in a vote at the table if it comes down to a vote.

Therefore, they are actually involved in co-determination, but the way things are written it does not look as if there is co-determination. It puts doubt in the mind and if the amendment was made it would give it more positiveness.

I followed the Minister's description of the minimum amount of disclosure of information at one end of the spectrum and co-determination at the other. I appreciate his position. The Bill is important because it gives a legislative push to the area of sub-board structures and that is a step in the right direction, but co-determination actually means something much more substantial than that in practice. Indeed, the German experience underlines the extent of what is meant by co-determination.

Furthermore, no doubt in drafting the Bill the Minister had to take all views into account on both sides and, therefore, in the search for a consensus this is the best that could have been reached at present. The Minister, after all, had to adopt a careful path to ensure that the legislation could be put in place and that it would have the support of both sides through the legislative push he is now giving it and the hope for consensus to implement it.

I fully appreciate the difficulties of the Minister and I appreciate the observations of Senator Hillery. I think we have established, now that we have it on record, that we are very concerned about the question of interpretation of co-determination. In the light of what the Minister has said we will not press the amendment.

I support Senator Harte on the basis that the Minister has confirmed that he would not rule out co-determination if that was agreed in the structures. The Bill does not rule it out. We were anxious to have it ruled in positively. The Minister is now assuring us that this concept is not ruled out and that he feels that legislatively speaking there is no need to have it written in this way. We accept that if that is what he is saying.

That is what we are saying, and I repeat again that in our view section 6 is a pragmatic approach to a diversity of views about the nature of participation which recognises the common ground among all the interests Senators have been explaining and provides a realistic and sound basis for the development of worker involvement. That is what we are trying to do throughout this Bill. I am being asked to clarify how there is nothing in the Bill which would preclude the relevant interests in any State enterprises from concluding agreements which would enhance co-determination arrangements. That is a matter for them in their own discussions.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

I move amendment No. 2:

In page 7, between lines 30 and 31, to insert a new paragraph as follows:

"(d) the giving by the specified body, at least 100 days in advance, to such persons as the agreement may provide all information relating to proposals which will reduce the numbers employed in the specified body, or lead to a shedding of any portion or unit of the specified body's business, or involve any other company taking shares in the specified body."

Under this section the Minister has spoken about providing the information on a downward basis, and obviously the most desirable course of disseminating information is on the basis of education upwards, or downwards, or horizontally. Obviously you cannot write that into a Bill. It provides for information on a regular basis. If we do not get sufficient time in advance of something happening or some major event, we will not have been getting information in its fullest sense. What usually happens in cases of major importance in many large firms is that it is an overnight or an 11th hour thing for decisions to be made when, in fact, the whole spirit of entering into an agreement like this is that there would be a continuing dialogue and that the information would be fed in at an earlier time which would allow for a sort of cooling off if there was anything controversial in it. Before it would percolate down to the floor in the wrong context, this would have been gone through correctly. If it is gone through correctly the idea of avoiding unnecessary conflict, which we are liable to wind up with, would have been pursued. We feel the period of 100 days is the ideal thing, where people can have an opportunity to examine it, get it disseminated through the body, get an understanding and interpretation of it. For example, if you were bringing in a work study scheme or a job evaluation scheme for board decision — and some of these schemes have very difficult and complex wording — and if you were to throw it at people, it is very unlikely that you would get them to understand it very quickly because no time would have elapsed. This could be taken care of in the context of the procedural arrangements between the unions and management. The danger is there and it should be watched.

If you wanted to take people into a company who take shares, let us say, in in some of the State bodies — I am not suggesting the Minister would pursue privatisation; I was looking at Sunday night's programme and I can say that with some conviction — it would have to be looked at on its merits. If it was felt that this was an opportune time to float the share idea and allow another company to take shares — and the question of private and public enterprise working together would not be a bad concept in the overall — there would a danger of confusion and the information might not get down correctly if it had to be done fairly quickly. There is reason why 100 days could not be given to people who need time to digest it. I am not saying this in a derogatory way. I do not want somebody to ask me to withdraw it because I am not saying it in a derogatory way. As an ex-soldier I would say in the vernacular that you have got to cater for the thickest fellow in the squad. We have all different levels of education. For example, it takes me longer to read a Bill than it might take somebody else in the House. In order to facilitate everybody we should allow for the guy who is liable to get the wrong end of the stick and who has nobody to lead him into it in the proper way.

Speaking in the vernacular my colleague Senator Harte put it in its most easily understood form. We are talking about a new subsection following the previous sections dealing with information. The sooner information is available to people who are being asked to make decisions on it, to examine it and to either agree or disagree with it, by the specified body, the more likelihood there is of its being properly addressed, dealt with and examined to the fullest extent. That information would be of interest to the company. It is appropriate that the workers and their representatives on the board should be made fully aware of all the details of what is required so that a value judgment can be given. In the long term the interest of the workers is to maintain the company and thereby maintain the jobs of themselves and their colleagues whom they have been elected to represent.

We had to pick a number of days we thought would be acceptable to the Minister and to the other sides in companies which have had to bite the bullet in accepting from the Minister the concept of the extension of worker participation in their business. I compliment the Minister on that. We are suggesting that this responsible body of people should have as much information as possible. We suggest 100 days which is about three months.

We went on further in the new subsection to specify some information we thought was important to identify, which is often given when the worker directors are not present. In Bord na Móna, when it comes to short time working, short time redundancies or the witholding of work from people in that company the worker directors were asked to leave the room when decisions were taken on the basis that the managing director of the company felt they had a vested interest.

We had a certain amount of agreement with the Minister on Second Stage of the Bill when we all said it was important to have workers' representatives involved in the decision making process. They have a vested interest, but we would argue that their vested interest is in the overall interest of the company and the workers. There is concern among workers in the public sector who read and hear on a daily basis in the media the concept that somehow or another the private sector can involve itself in profit making companies and that there is nothing wrong with disposing of that into the private sector.

Senator Harte welcomed the views of the Minister in this. It is refreshing to hear somebody like the Minister confirming his attitude to the public sector and to Government and public sector employment which is in the interests of the country and the taxpayer. Nobody on this side of the House will defend a public sector which is inefficient. We fought long and hard to ensure that the public sector was efficient. The private sector tend to show an interest in public sector companies which are showing profits. They rarely get involved in public sector companies which give a social service.

We maintain that information about who wants to buy into public sector companies should be communicated as quickly as possible to workers. If we take an example of the amalgamation of NET and the pharmaceutical chemical company which bought in with them, that additional dimension to the company, which is beneficial and had a lot of things going for it, one of their requirements was that there would be no worker participation in the new amalgamated company of a public sector and of a British pharmaceutical company joining with them. We are anxious that the longest possible time should be given to this kind of information, that it should be teased out and discussed at various levels and that a considered opinion could then be given by the worker directors when they come to making a final decison by co-determination or otherwise.

This section is one of the most difficult ones to come to terms with. I agree with the thrust of the amendment put forward by the Labour Party and I agree with the thinking that led to it. People are afraid of a situation where workers in a workplace find that a decision can be taken either to close down a company or implement a range of redundancies which would put people out of work, or decisions of that order, and that the workers who suffer at the end of the day will hear nothing about it until the day of implementation. Everybody is afraid of that kind of thing happening.

I do not know whether we can legislate for every possible exception, with respect to Senator Harte. I take the point he makes. I am not sure we can always bring it that far. I agree with the general point that information should be made available earlier. When I was trying to frame something on it I tried to think what would be an appropriate number of days and I must confess that I came up with 30. I cannot give a reason for coming up with the number 30 except that it seemed a good idea at the time.

With reference to paragraph (b) of the same section, I prefer the wording of this paragraph. I would prefer to use the words "which are liable to have a significant effect on the interests of employees" than to try to cover all the different things which are covered in the amendment. Things like shedding of the business or the loss of employment would certainly have a very significant effect on the interests of employees but the significant effect on the interests of employees is a wider thing perhaps. You cannot legislate for what happens if an elephant walks into the general manager's front office. You cannot cover every single thing that is liable to happen.

I suspect that the Labour Party were referring to the weakness of the words "in good time" in that subsection, in other words, where it says in paragraph (b), "giving by the specified body of relevant information in good time..." I believe the Labour Party are trying to interpret "in good time" as 100 days, which is certainly a reasonable way of interpreting it. If there is some difficulty with that amendment would it be possible to build into it something that would not stop the decision being taken? I know that if you spread information widely beforehand, whatever value there might be in the decision, getting that word out to the competitors of the company might not be in the workers best interests either. This is the problem I have.

On the one hand workers should have any information which might lead to workers being made redundant, might lead to a factory closure, or might lead to something which would worsen their conditions. On the other hand, I am aware that by disclosing information in advance about a decision that is liable to be taken by the board, or by the company, it then becomes available to the competitors of that company who may be able to take steps to undermine whatever value might come out of it. The only way I could resolve my difficulty is by asking the Minister if it would be possible to consider some kind of step between proposals and implementation, in other words, to replace the idea of a decision wherever it occurs with the idea of a proposal to be implemented. This would be given as information to employees before implementation, in other words, to find the views of the employees.

The reason I agree with the Labour Party amendment is that I think information is power in many ways. Information is power because the idea of keeping information from workers in a company is like saying to them that they do not understand it. There is a certain arrogance in many instances in saying: "We will not tell the workers what is happening in the boardroom because the workers would not be able to understand any figure higher than £100 a week." That thinking is still there.

Irish workers at the moment are people of the highest calibre who can certainly understand how their company works. In fact, I would make it a requirement that workers should know how their company works. Therefore, if the general body of workers in a company are given the same access to information, are given the same set of circumstances, they will more than likely come to a similar decision to that of the board, always remembering, of course, that the factory owners and proprietors are in there to make a profit. That is their investment in the company.

The workers are in there to get a weekly wage, to be in employment. They have a much longer commitment to the company because workers have a lifetime invested in it and the owner may just be committed to making a profit out of it. The owner cona sell the company, walk away from it and live on the profits. The worker can only sell his or her labour and skills at the end of the day. We are really doing the workers in a company a disservice in this instance by not making information available to them. If there is a difficulty with the proposals from the Labour Party the sense of it could be taken on board with some kind of a minor change in paragraph (b) to delay the implementation of proposals, in other words, rather than to impose decisions to have proposals to be implemented at a later date after consultation with the workers.

I do not disagree in a broad sense with Senator O'Toole. Indeed, I appreciate many of the observations he has made. Because of our enthusiasm we may be a little over-zealous here and we may be broadening the thing out from State enterprises into the private sector. That is not our intention. We are trying to stick to what is before us in so far as it is possible to do so.

I would like to mention the question of days. There is no use in rehashing what I said about the deleterious effect on workers if they do not get the information in sufficient time. I am not hung up on 100 days, nor am I hung up on 30 days because it is too close to the minimum notice. If the Minister might find something between the two.

A number of points were made. Senator Harte is answering some of the points he raised himself. It is not for me to determine what the parties involved in the participation might agree to. In a particular enterprise, they will have regard to the appropriate time requirement. That is something we are trying to encourage.

We are trying to provide worker participation to give a floor and platform for workers to be involved in discussions about their company and their future. That is the whole ethos of the legislation. We are trying to avoid writing detailed provisions into the Bill. We are agreed on that following our Second Stage debate. In my view a provision of this nature could be seen by both the social partners as discharging the obligation to reach agreement and consensus on the treatment of major issues. That is what we want to avoid. By being clear about it and writing it in, the section would then enshrine in law current concerns of some State enterprises.

Senator Ferris made the point that these are the things which are on people's minds and that you cannot stop these issues being on people's minds. However, it would not address dominant issues which could arise in enterprises or concerns after the Bill has been on the Statute Book for five or ten years. If you start writing in one thing and you leave out another it is quite dangerous.

Perhaps Senator O'Toole was thinking as we in the Department of Labour were when he mentioned 30 days. In trying to address this problem, it was highlighted to me that there are already in the Protection of Employment Act, 1977, statutory arrangements in case of collective redundancies. That is really what the amendment is about. Collective redundancies can involve as little as five persons out of a workforce of between 20 and 50 employees over any period of 30 consecutive days. The Act imposes an obligation on an employer contemplating collective redundancy to consult with the representatives of the employees affected at the earliest opportunity and, in any event, at least 30 days before the first dismissal takes place. That protects the proposals in the amendment. They are protected for as long as the 1977 Act is in force. The Act specifies what the consultations must cover so it is quite clear that it covers the point being made. In the circumstances, therefore, I do not think it is necessary to do what the Senators are proposing. In any event, it is open to the parties — this is an important point which I should like to point out — under section 6 (2) (a) and section 6(2) (b) of the Bill to cover whatever range which they consider appropriate. In addition, the final sentence of 6(2) reads:

... and the arrangements shall contain such other provisions as may be agreed by the parties thereto.

It provides further flexibility to the parties to any sub-board arrangement to include whatever other issues they wish. Taking into account the Protection of Employment Act, 1977, which is already statutorily there and the sections I have just referred to — I accept that Senator Harte and Senator Ferris are anxious that there should be some protection — I think we have covered the point.

I was glad the Minister highlighted the statutory arrangements that are already in place for collective redundancies. That should go a long way to meet the concern about the reduction in numbers. In the course of the debate on Second Stage, as the Minister implied there, we viewed one of the main merits of the Bill as being the flexibility that will allow individual State-sponsored bodies to meet the individual circumstances of their own organisations.

The point made by the previous speakers is that there is indeed a reluctance by employers to divulge important information to stake holders in the company. This would include divulging information to employees who are keys stake holders, to their suppliers, or to customers, or to bankers. In other words, when companies are nearing difficulty, especially in the private sector, there is this extraordinary behaviour whereby management and owners conceal the plight of the companies from all concerned.

The value of disclosing the plight to workers, far from inviting militancy, would be that they are the very people, precisely because their livelihood depends on the companies, who might well be the first to come up with ideas which might mean wage freezes, wage cuts, or actually ideas and expertise that are there in the company. Which would help to rescue it and make it more viable in the future. On balance, flexibility is appropriate in the case of the Bill but there is a continuing concern about the private sector, which is not covered by the Bill, about those employers who conceal the plight of their companies to the disadvantage of all concerned, including themselves as owners in the long run.

We will not press this amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Section 6 agreed to.
Section 7 agreed to.
SECTION 8.
Question proposed: "That section 8 stand part of the Bill."

I want to make a point on section 8 as it is the only place I can raise it. It refers to, "All expenses incurred by a specified body in relation to the establishing...". It has got to do with the general expenses of running this operation of worker directors. There was a reference earlier by one of the previous speakers to the fact one of these companies we are now talking about could be taken over by other companies; it could be backed into another company, or could take over another company with the completely new ethos of the new take over management. A company now working under the terms of this Bill could be taken over by another company which was not within the scheme. This would make it very difficult to carry out these arrangements.

I am not just talking about the arrangements for consultation alone referred to here, but the whole working of the worker director scheme. If I am working in an office in a company and I am elected as a worker director, I am out of that office when I am working as a director, or making sure that the arrangements in section 6 are carried out, in other words, that the consultation is taking place. What support can I get if the new company do not allow me to do this?

I have raised on a number of occasions problems which could arise hypothetically, but I am speaking about a particular problem in this case. I know a worker director who has been seriously impeded in a situation which was referred to earlier. The board could say: "No, we will not allow you out of your office today even though you are an elected worker director. We will not give you leave." I know one worker director who has used up all his annual leave doing his work as a worker director. That is not something the Minister would be supportive of but I wonder in terms of this section would the expenses arising from the work of a worker director be covered in that sense?

I am aware of the case Senator O'Toole is talking about. I am sure the Minister is aware of it as he is being advised as well. There is a specific problem in this area and I am not sure if this section covers it. It deals with the term "expenses involved". A worker director to participate and perform his duty properly under existing law is allowed the day before or part of the day before to prepare himself for a board meeting. That was accepted and understood by the board as being a legitimate part of his worker director duties in preparation for a board meeting. Then he would attend the meeting.

He also has an opportunity to report back to his representatives on what happened at the board meeting particularly in the area which he was allowed to discuss with them. There are some actions of boards of directors on which they cannot report back. As a result of the take over of this company — it was not taken over in a majority sense — the participating outside influence is a minority interest but, because they have a funny attitude to the concept of worker participation, the 49 per cent interest is now telling the 51 per cent interest that not alone do they not want worker directors, but the company who had accepted worker directors will not allow the worker directors the same latitude they had in the past under the other legislation.

Facilities which were available to this worker director and two of his colleagues have been withdrawn, including telephone facilities, office facilities, filing cabinets and that sort of penny pinching which has gone on as a result of this amalgamation. Financially this was a great deal to have but in reality, on the ground, when they were trying to work the concept of worker participation was thrown back in their faces and they are finding it most difficult to accept. They brought it to the attention of the Department and they have letters confirming their terms of employment as worker directors. They cannot operate within the restrictions placed on them. I would like the Minister to confirm that he will not tolerate that kind of intrusion into an accepted standard of facilities for worker directors in the performance of their duties.

I am sure which amendment that is. I am familiar with the point. We raised it on Second Stage. It is my intention to ensure that worker directors are allowed, as far as I have power, which is limited in some regards to attend board meetings. It is the Minister concerned in any of these cases who has a direct say in it. I discussed the issues with the worker directors who have been referred to here. I mentioned publicly on at least two occasions that we are extremely disappointed that these difficulties are arising.

As I understand it, the worker directors involved are entitled to go to board meetings but there are other difficulties about conditions they had in the past. A number of times, at least once as Minister and on other occasions which I was Opposition spokesman, I met the worker directors. This is an issue that has arisen in recent time only. There is a great variance between the conditions afforded to worker directors and anything that interferes with them is a major concern. I would have to say at the same time that expenses and time off for worker directors are matters for the enterprise and the Departments concerned. I have interested and will continue to interest myself in the issues that are raised.

Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 9.

Amendment No. 4 is an alternative and amendment No. 5 is consequential on amendments Nos. 3, 4 and 5 and may be discussed together. If amendment No. 3 is accepted, amendment No. 4 cannot be moved. Therefore, we will take amendments Nos. 3, 4 and 5 to section 9.

Government amendment No. 3:
In page 8, to delete lines 35 to 39, and substitute the following paragraph:
"(a) a request in writing has been made to the appropriate Minister jointly by the designated body concerned and by representatives of employees of such body, and a copy of such request has been sent by the designated body concerned to the Minister, and".

Senators will recall that in my reply to the Second Stage debate I indicated to the House that I would bring forward an amendment to section 9. The amendments now before the House will allow for the extension of the franchise to subsidiaries only where agreement has been reached between the designated State enterprises concerned and the representative of the employees of that body. We had much discussion about this issue to try to overcome it over a long period, and such an approach is more in keeping, in my view, with the participation and the participative approach which the legislation seeks to foster. This is being consistent with what we are trying to do throughout the Bill — to maintain a consensus. I am confident this amendment addresses the reservation rightly expressed by Senators on Second Stage.

We have to be concerned about this Bill we are amending the principle of the worker director arrangements. This is very serious, deep and complex legislation. It means that the Minister may enfranchise by order employees of subsidiaries of State enterprises for the purpose of worker director member elections to the board of the parent enterprise. Such an order would extend the vote and worker director member elections to employees of the subsidiary and would entitle their trade unions to nominate candidates and to call for a preliminary poll, subject to the provisions of the Principal Act.

I must admit I do not like using the word "majority" in the representative sense, but there is a dilemma here. If there are many unions representing workers in the parent company and you extend the right of worker participation in the subsidiaries to be elected on to the parent board, that would be a good idea and must be welcomed. Say there were craft unions and perhaps two or three general unions representing the workers in the parent company they might come to an arrangement amongst themselves when it came to voting on industrial relations matters. In an extreme situation, if there were only one plasterer in the place, under that arrangement his representative would be entitled to one vote while another person representing 200 fitters might also have just one vote. There is no sense in that ratio. It could happen that one person representing ten members and another representing 200, would each have one vote, and they might want somebody from a subsidiary to be appointed to the board of directors, although such an appointment would be unrepresentative and he would have to offer himself for election.

The part of the section I do not like is that we had to use the term "majority" and we found difficulty with this. We are trying to prevent the abuse of the system where people who represent a minority of workers, can be elected as directors. This is worrying and I would like to hear the Minister's observations on it.

Senator Harte has summed up our dilemma. We discussed this with the trade unions involved who have a lot of expertise in this area. We adopted the attitude that when representatives of the employees were involved that should meet the case. I thank the Minister for confirming during the Second Stage debate that he was working at bringing in possible amendments to the section, and he has come forward with amendments which are almost duplicates of what we suggested, although, there is a subtle difference between the two amendments.

We have the problem that the representatives might not represent the majority of employees in a company. We want to ensure that, in the interests of democracy, the majority of the people in the company would be able to express their view through their elected representatives. Many workers will have the right to nominate only one member and other workers in a different craft will also be entitled to nominate one member. We want to ensure that there will be a consensus of the majority of the people involved. That is democracy in Ireland. People in Northern Ireland have another view of "majority". I am very anxious to hear the Minister's views on this.

This is another section the Minister spent a lot of time thinking and talking about, and so did everybody else who has had any interest in this Bill. At an early stage I thought there was no way of resolving the issue, and that the decision to consult only with management, as written in the original section, was totally unacceptable. I believe if there is going to be a change, those outlined in the two amendments are the practical way to do it. I am looking at this pragmatically and from the point of view of legislation, and it is my belief that if we are going to change the section, the Labour Party amendment is better than the Minister's.

I am not saying this in a derogatory way, but in all honesty and fairness because at the end of the day, requests in writing could come from the body itself and from the representative of two people out of 10,000 employees, and that would have fulfilled the terms of the Bill. I make the case that the Labour Party amendment is stronger than the Minister's amendment because it is more efficient, more effective and tighter. I think the thrust of the Minister's amendment is right but putting in the representatives of the majority of the employees covers all the different points Senators have tried to address.

Leaving out the word "majority" in effect means a person may be representing only a small minority, even a minuscule number of workers in the company. If, for instance, management decide to ignore the trade union movement, or if they want to ignore all the representative bodies looking after their employees, all they need to do is ask three people in the company to form a club and say they want to be part of this move. They can write to the appropriate Minister and say "Dear Minister, this communiqué is jointly from ourselves and representatives of the workers." The fact that 99 per cent of the workers are not represented in that communiqué signifies that it is very weak. Therefore, if the Minister believes his own arguments, he might consider withdrawing his amendment and supporting ours. That would be the most effective way to do it.

I spent a lot of time working on this section and in direct discussion with the interests involved. A form of words close to the Labour Party amendment was suggested at one stage but there were difficulties. We framed this amendment after detailed discussions to get over those difficulties.

Section 6 (5) of the Bill reads:

In this Act "representatives of employees" means such persons as may be nominated by a trade union or other body of persons which the appropriate officer is satisfied is recognised for the purposes of collective bargaining negotiations by the specified body concerned.

The Bill identifies who the representatives are and it is important that that definition is included because it deals with the point made by Senator Harte. For me to amend it any other way would mean deleting that section because it would be contrary to section 6 (5).

There is an additional problem. "Representatives of employees" is defined in the Bill and "repesentatives of the majority of employees" is not, and this could give rise to difficulties of definition. The question of ballots and other forms of head counts could arise. If Senators remember, initially I had to tackle in this section the question of the votes of employees in subsidiaries. We were trying to ensure that the main subsidiary of Aer Lingus would never be the substantive majority of the employees of Aer Lingus. We had to find a way to ensure that a hotel company, a computer company or a manufacturing company, which has nothing to do with or was not even allied to an airport company, could out-vote the interests of the main company. That is what we set out to do. Under this section we are ensuring for all time that the worker directors, the people involved in worker participation, will be directly concerned with the main company and not the subsidiaries. As I said, my amendment is well thought out, because I had the benefit of several hours of direct discussion with those involved.

Sometimes the Minister is right. There was a little concern there because we are talking about house associations. For example, if a house association made inroads into trade union membership, because they had won negotiation rights and were designated as a representative body, they would be included also. That is where the word "majority" is important. I accept what the Minister has said and I am not pressing the amendment.

That very important point is made in section 6 (5). This Bill is drafted with flexibility in mind and section 6 (5) ties that down.

I accept that.

Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 4 not moved.
Government amendment No. 5:
In page 8, to delete lines 42 to 48.
Amendment agreed to.
Question proposed: "That section 9, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

I want to put on record our appreciation of the fact that the Minister amended this section in accordance with the views that he expressed now and which were expressed by many employees' representatives since the Bill was initiated. The anomaly in the Bill as initiated has now been put aside. The Minister redefined "representatives of employees." We accept the reasons for his amendment.

Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 10.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Amendments Nos. 6, 7, 12 to 27, 29, 31 to 36 are related and may be discussed together.

Government amendment No. 6:
In page 10, to delete lines 7 to 9, and to substitute the following:
"(a) (i) as regards Siúicre Éireann cuideachta phoiblí theoranta, An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann, 1988, and each successive fourth year thereafter,".

In reply to the Second Stage debate I mentioned that consideration had been given to the addition of An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann to the Bill for worker director arrangements. This was mentioned by Senator Ferris at that time. I am pleased to introduce a number of amendments which add these enterprises to the Bill and make the necessary repeals of the Postal and Telecommunication Services Act, 1983. This is the first of eight amendments arising out of the addition of An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann to the Bill. Section 10 of the Bill provides for worker director elections every four years as against three years up to now. The amendment will allow worker directors elections to take place in An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann under this legislation. The next election will be held in November of this year and every fourth successive year thereafter.

I warmly and sincerely thank the Minister for bringing in these amendments and, in particular, for bringing An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann into line with the other bodies in the four year election period. That was a source of great concern to the worker directors, to the employees and to the trade union representatives. I raised this matter on Second Stage and I know that the Minister took counsel with the workers' representatives in the various trade unions.

The press have walked out just when I was about to compliment the Minister. Legislation is about putting forward proposals, listening to how they develop, and making whatever changes are appropriate. We have seen that in this House when we were discussing the Companies (No. 2) Bill over the past number of months, and we have seen it here again today. I would like to compliment the Minister on taking on board those firmly held views, and I am glad to have had an input into the Bill. This is a very progressive move and will be welcomed not just by the workers but by the trade union movement in general.

I welcome the Minister's move in this direction. Even though the Bill is not concluded at this time, we have to congratulate him on the way he tackled these amendments and for meeting the various representatives. Before this debate concludes I may have something else to say, but it looks good at the moment.

I am delighted the Minister has seen fit to include companies, which, up to now, were excluded. Could I draw the attention of the House to amendment No. 17? In amendment No. 16 the Minister has included An Post and Bord Telecom Éireann and in amendment No. 17 we have included Radio Telefís Éireann, Bord Telecom Éireann and An Post, but there is something fundamental missing. Are we discussing amendment No. 17 in this list of amendments? I am looking for guidance. Is amendment No. 17 included? May I ask the Minister why he did not see fit to include Radio Telefis Éireannn in his list?

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

May I clarify the position? We are discussing amendments Nos. 6 and 7, 12 to 27, inclusive, 29 and 31 to 36, inclusive.

Perhaps I could explain that a number of these amendments relate to additions to the Bill. As Senators will appreciate and will be aware, until now, to give worker director status to any particular body or organisation, new legislation had to be introduced through the Cabinet, a fairly lengthy system, and then through both Houses of the Oireachtas. I cannot give any commitment to include any other bodies because it would be a matter for the Government to decide. I would have to say the same thing if we were to debate each of these amendments through the afternoon. The difficulty with any additional body is that it is primarily a matter for the Minister and the organisation concerned. In this Bill we have added Aer Rianta and the National Rehabilitation Institute where, up to now, there was agreement. In future, where there is agreement between the organisation and the Minister, under section 24, an order can be enacted without having to go through the Houses. I ask Senator Ferris and others to accept that that is the best I can do at this stage. This removes a huge cumbersome system which has been in operation the past ten or 11 years since the first legislation in this area was introduced. I cannot accept any amendment trying to add another organisation at this stage.

What the Minister is saying is that the legislation as framed will allow him by ministerial order, if agreement is reached in the Cabinet, to include any new State or semi-State company not listed here, and they will not necessarily be precluded in the future if agreement is forthcoming from the organisation itself.

The Minister and the parent organisation.

We are leaving a lot of power with the Minister and there are already many redesignations of responsibility. Is the Minister saying that neither the board of Radio Telefis Éireann nor the Minister has agreed in principle to the concept of worker participation on the board of RTE?

They have agreed to sub-board participation. I said this in 1977 particularly in relation to RTE. We should have made sub-board participative arrangements in all these organisations and, where they worked out successfully, where a certain amount of trust and co-operation had developed between employees and employers, the parent Minister and the organisation could decide whether they should have worker directors. That would have been a useful exercise. What we are doing is adding in. In my view, this is putting the cart before the horse. It is better to have a sub-board relationship for some time and under this legislation we are including RTE and all the organisations listed in the Schedule at sub-board level.

Amendment agreed to.
Government amendment No. 7:
In page 10, line 12, to delete "the B + I Line public limited company", and to substitute "the B & I Line public limited company".
Amendment agreed to.
Question proposed: "That section 10, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

The Minister has not included the new board of Teagasc, which is mentioned in a list of amendments. A lot of concern is expressed by the workers, scientists and people involved in this proposed new board. The board of ACOT was included but the proposed new amalgamated board was not included, although the Minister said it is not excluded either. If the Minister concerned and the board agree, it can be included later by ministerial order. Much concern has been expressed by the workers who have not opted for voluntary redundancy.

It is desirable that we should legislate in this Bill for the inclusion of the new board even though, in theory, it has not been set up because the Bill has not been passed. It is not outside our remit to include it, even if it never comes into being. Since earlier boards were included and designated, why not the new board, which has created a lot of controversy not because of its amalgamation but because of an insufficiency of funds allocated by the Government? I have to put this into the record because——

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

The legislation has not been passed or printed.

I need the Minister's assurance about this.

Question put and agreed to.
Section 11 agreed to.
SECTION 12.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Amendments Nos. 8 and 9 are related and may be discussed together.

I move amendment No. 8:

In page 11, subsection (2), line 26, to delete "on the day" and substitute ", subject to subsection (3)*, one week".

This Bill is about putting workers on the board but this section deals with what happens when they are no longer employees of the corporation. It is about the position which arises when a person ceases to be an employee and, therefore, ceases to be a member. It is fine when somebody leaves voluntarily; there is no problem. Senator O'Toole referred to this in his Second Stage speech and I relate to it. What happens in the event of a dismissal and a case is taken subsequently under the Unfair Dismissals Act? It seems that if the machinery is put into operation the day afterwards to replace the person on the board, it does not give any opportunity for the former worker director to maintain his position or to regain his position on the board. I would like to know if the Minister has considered this and if it is possible to open it up and look at what the position would be in the event of an appeal against the dismissal.

Through my own fault I do not have an amendment down as it was late in arriving. I agree with the spirit of this amendment. As I said on Second Stage, the difficulty here is that an unscrupulous board could dismiss a worker, who happens to be a director, and in that sense the worker director would be off the board. In the event of a dismissal being challenged under the Unfair Dismissals Act the suspension should not come into operation pending the processing of the appeal. In other words, somebody would not lose his position as worker director overnight as the process of appeal would have to take place before that could happen. Whether through the amendment tabled by Senator Fennell or by any other means the proposal here is to prevent the Act being abused. In effect, where dismissal of the worker director is being appealed, the appeal should take its course, should be held, should be heard and processed before that person would lose his position as a worker director. It is a very reasonable position. Unless there is something of substance which we are not aware of I appeal to the Minister to consider taking on board this idea.

Legally, it is unfair to a person who could lose his seat on the board and be involved in an election programme, or not even have an opportunity to put himself forward for an election. Not only could he lose his position on the board but he could also lose the option of being re-elected and would be totally out. As I understand it, the Unfair Dismissals Act would not allow a redress which would include putting somebody back on the board without an election. I do not believe they could do that but perhaps the Minister would clarify it. My understanding of the Act is that the redress and the solution that can be proposed under the terms of the Unfair Dismissals Act would not allow them to do that. As well as that, an election could have taken place perhaps before a hearing. It depends on how quickly people move. There is a flaw in the Bill before us. Perhaps the Minister can make a case of some substance to which we have not adverted. I do not know if there is a difficulty with the actual amendment. I am sure Senator Fennell would like the Minister to take on board the problem and to hear his views on it and, perhaps, to signify that he will come back with a change on this issue.

Apart from the question of somebody losing his job for a number of reasons, there is one thing which worries me. If as a result of taking legal action, or as a result of an industrial dispute, somebody loses his job, is it the intention that that person, because he actually ceases to be an employee, can no longer be a director? While it is not written into Senator Fennell's amendment, it is an aspect, having regard to what Senator O'Toole has said, which the Minister will have to take into consideration. No safeguards are provided for a worker director who ceases to be an employee following a legal or an industrial dispute.

We had some discussion on this matter on Second Stage and we have had some consultations on it. The purpose of section 12 is to ensure that employees are represented by fellow workers on the board and in the unusual circumstance of the dismissal of a worker director, a legislative approach gives no flexibility in response to the actual situation as it arises. On the other hand, an administrative approach provides a degree of flexibility to meet requirements on a case by case basis. For example, the vacancy could be held open pending the outcome of any claim for unfair dismissal which a former worker director might bring. In other circumstances a worker director dismissed for, say, misuse of funds might make it inappropriate to hold open the vacancy. Not filling the vacancy would mean that employees in the enterprise concerned would be without representation of a worker director in the period between a dismissal and the presentation of the appeal.

A further consideration in deciding against making statutory provision for holding open the vacancy in such cases is that it is generally not the practice of the Employment Appeals Tribunal to recommend reinstatements. The general avenue of appeal against unfair dismissal is the Employment Appeals Tribunal. The timescale for lodging an appeal is six months. One would need, therefore, to have some indication of the nature of the particular case before deciding to hold open the vacancy. I understand the arguments put forward by Senator Fennell, today and on Second Stage, Senator O'Toole and others and we have considered this matter at some length not just now but in framing the Bill. We came to the conclusion, after consultation with the Attorney General's office, that in the unlikely event of such a case arising it should be dealt with administratively.

I am not clear on this. Let me say immediately that I accept the idea in section 12 that workers should be represented by worker directors who are fellow workers. There is no place in this legislation for a non worker being a worker director. I have no difficulty whatsoever about that. I want to deal with the idea of the tribunal and the six months. The six months appeal in the Employment Appeals Tribunal is to enable workers to understand their rights. Very often a worker who has been dismissed would not be aware that he or she could appeal against it and the six months is built in there to allow them to find out that they have a right to do something, to have consultations and to get advice. With worker directors it is completely different because in the main, they will know their rights and know where they stand.

I would see nothing wrong, for instance, with putting in a clause — and it would in no sense be illegal — in contravention of the early legislation to say that, where an appeal has been lodged and a specific time put on it, for example, a week while the appeal is being processed we will allow him to continue as a worker director provided that he lodges his appeal within a week of dismissal. One of the difficulties, as I am sure the Minister is aware, with the unfair dismissals legislation is that you have to be dismissed before you can appeal against it. That is one of the big problems with that legislation. Very often it is impossible to reverse the situation. If I am told today that I will be sacked in a month's time, under the unfair dismissals legislation I can do nothing until the month has expired. That has always been a weakness in that legislation. I think the Minister would consider it a weakness also.

I want to deal with the question of holding open a vacancy. I would not be in favour of holding open the vacancy. That does not fit in the Bill. I am talking about somebody who has been unfairly dealt with. If somebody has been properly dismissed he has been properly dismissed. We are not saying people may not be dismissed. It is the companies interests and the workers' interests we must look at. It could be arranged to have somebody dismissed and, therefore, he would not be present for a vital vote, or series of votes, or decisions to be taken at board level. This can happen. It is patently unfair how this could be used.

I do not understand — the Minister will have to spell it out — the administrative way in which this problem could be dealt with. I am not sure about that. As I understand it, if somebody is dismissed he is out of the worker directorship the following day. Therefore, I do not know how that could be dealt with administratively. Perhaps the Minister could point out something to me in legislation which would allow the Minister to intervene at that point, to say that it is to be put on hold until some procedure is invoked. If that were the case it would at least ameliorate the problem but not resolve it. It certainly does not resolve it for me because one never knows who the Minister may be. I would prefer the law to work on its own and the hearing to be held independently of ministerial involvement. I think that is the way the Minister would prefer it.

I do not understand the administrative process which could resolve the problem raised by myself, Senator Fennell and others. I do not believe that holding open the vacancy would resolve the problem. Finally, the period allowed for lodging an appeal should be shortened in this case. It would not damage the unfair dismissals legislation to say in this Bill, provided always that the appeal is lodged within a number of days, a week or whatever.

I want to get in before Senator Fennell as she will want to respond to some of the debate on her amendment, which is an excellent one. All of us, including the Minister, understand why Senator Fennell put down these amendments. It was put down to address an anomaly that could arise. Nobody is against the principle involved in section 12 that workers should be represented on the board by people who are co-workers. We all agree with that. We are trying to legislate for the possibility of the other situation arising. We are legislating for something which makes administrative flexibility impossible, unless the Minister can convince me otherwise.

Section 12 says that if a person ceases to be a member or worker he ceases to be a board member. It does not give any exclusion whatsoever. It does not allow the flexibility which the Minister feels might be there. It is probably written in small print somewhere else and we do not know about it. If it is not — and the Minister cannot confirm it — this section is too strong and he will have to accept Senator Fennell's amendment or come up with an alternative which would allow genuine cases to appeal against sacking, indiscriminate or otherwise, and which would allow another forum to decide whether the reasons were justified. In her amendment Senator Fennell does not rule out the possibility that the person was unfairly dismissed. If so the appeal will be upheld and he will still be a board member. If the appeal is lost the person immediately loses his place on the board. Nothing sounds more reasonable to me than Senator Fennell's amendment. I am anxious to hear how the Minister hopes to have administrative flexibility in a section which allows none.

I would like to reiterate what the other Senators have said. We are talking about very rare cases here. I accept the point made by the Minister earlier that he wants to have flexibility in this law. We should recognise that a grave injustice could be done in the case of a dismissal which was subsequently decided as unfair. Somebody who had gone through the process of putting himself forward for election, canvassing, getting support and becoming a member loses all of that, as well as his job, and he cannot be reinstated.

The Minister mentioned that it could be dealt with administratively and that it was not necessary to have it in this legislation. I sincerely feel that the one day time limit is too short. Ideally we need more time, preferably a week, to see what the indicators are for the person concerned. Furthermore I appreciate the difficulty which might be involved in codifying something like this because I had difficulty — I only managed to do it with the help of the Seanad office — in drafting this proposed amendment. I ask the Minister seriously to consider what we are aiming at.

Just to be clear on this, we are dealing with amendment No. 8 to section 12. We have here in brackets "[This is the appropriate reference if amendment No. 9 is accepted.]" Which is the appropriate reference?

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Subsection (3).

I have already mentioned in my opening remarks the difficulties involved and, having considered all the kinds of issues which could arise and all the different ways in which a worker director could go, I believe it would be far better to deal with it administratively. Senator O'Toole asked where it was mentioned in the Act. It is in the 1977 Act. The Minister has power to hold open a vacancy. Section 22 of the 1977 Act allows the appropriate Minister to hold open the vacancy, pending the outcome of an unfair dismissals case, where he is satisfied that the circumstances warrant it. This would cover it rather than trying to write in particular circumstances.

I appreciate the Senator's difficulty in drafting the amendment. Without any great difficulty you could think of 20 reasons. On the Attorney General's advice the Minister of the day would have to consider the particular circumstances that arose and interpret them under the section I mentioned in the 1977 Act. If it was unjust any Minister of the day would have no difficulty in complying with the 1977 Act which allows the Minister to hold a vacancy open. Section 22 (1) states that:

... by reason of the death or resignation, or the disqualification by virtue of section 21 of this Act, of such a member or director, or by reason of no candidate, or of less candidates than there were places to be filled,...

In 1977 they were trying to build in some of the reasons. The section continues:

... having been nominated at the last election relating to the body, or by reason of section 16 of this Act the vacancy may be filled by a person appointed by the appropriate Minister.

The Minister can actually hold it open for a period. On the advice we have received, we are satisfied that that would allow us room to manoeuvre. In the unlikely event that this would happen — I accept that the unlikely can happen — this would overcome any of the range of issues that might arise.

Section 12(1) states that:

... a member or a director of a designated body, shall cease to be such member or director if, for any reason, he ceases to be an employee of that body.

It does not mention any time. Subsection (2) states that:

... a vacancy amongst the members or directors of the designated body concerned shall be deemed to have occurred on the day following the day on which such a person ceases...

That is very blunt and very abrupt. It does not leave the kind of room we were talking about to enable a decision to be made on the circumstances of a dismissal. I wonder if there could be some time limit built in.

I am not happy with this section. I have not got all of the Principal Act here. I am missing the second part of section 22 of the Principal Act. The part I have refers to casual vacancies. I understand section 22 of the 1977 Act refers to casual vacancies. We are not talking about a casual vacancy. Section 21 refers to the kind of disqualification which has arisen through sections 15 or 22 of the Principal Act. I do not believe that either of those fits the bill we are talking about here. I want to hear the Attorney General's advice on this issue. I want to hear what the legalities are. I want to understand why this cannot go ahead.

It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that the owner of a factory, or the proprietor, or the managing director, or somebody on a very senior level in a factory, or in a workplace, or in an industry, might be totally opposed to a particular worker. On the day that worker is elected as a worker director he could sack that person for no reason other than he did not like him. That is basically wrong. The Minister has not eased my mind on it. It is not clear to me. I listened to the Minister and I am not sure that it can be resolved. I believe we must address it. I do not know how we will address it.

We are saying that, where a worker director ceases to be an employee of the company, and where that dismissal is being appealed under the terms of the Act, he or she may continue as a worker director while the appeal is being processed, always providing, as we said earlier, that the appeal was lodged within a week of the dismissal and that there was no deliberate procrastination on behalf of the dismissed worker director. The Minister has not answered the point satisfactorily. I am determined on one point: references to the Attorney General do not frighten me. I want to know the points of law referred to one by one.

I am not entirely happy either because an excellent way to legislate is to try to consolidate what is already there. This section makes no reference to the Principal Act. If such a reference was made it would be easier for those involved in this area to be reassured that their interests were still protected under the 1977 Act. Indeed, the explanatory memorandum accompanying this Bill says:

The resulting vacancy shall be treated in the same way as a casual vacancy...

I presume the casual vacancy is the one referred to in the 1977 Act. I am suggesting that the explanatory memorandum was not sufficiently explanatory. If it was we might have been more reassured. I suggest that before the Bill goes to another House, if the Minister does not accept the concept of this amendment or come back with a further suggestion on Report Stage, this will have to be spelled out. Otherwise there will be a doubt in people's minds about how they would be protected, in the event of these circumstances arising, where employees would be dismissed and would therefore lose their position on the board, even pending an appeal. People should know that the 1977 Act already protects them and that they can lodge an appeal to the Minister under section 22 of the 1977 Act. In trying to assist us the 1977 Act could have been spelled out more and an effort could have been made to consolidate the original Act in this Bill.

As I said at the outset the 1977 Act has been there for 11 years and we never had any dispute. While I can think of lots of things off the top of my head that might happen I agree with Senator O'Toole that the type of individuals who are normally worker directors should be well informed and very clear on the legislation. It is unlikely that you would ever get into this eventuality, but it is a possibility. In our discussions with the Attorney General we discussed the various reasons a worker director would not be a worker director. We tried to see if there was some way in which that could be written into the legislation. When you are dismissed, for whatever reason, you can appeal your case but you cease to be an employee. Your contract of employment has ended. That is the position you would hold in law. I could argue that it has nothing at all to do with this Bill. A person could be hard done by if he was dismissed the day before an election or at some crucial period. If this was done without good grounds the whole enterprise could be out of action and there could be an immediate strike or a confrontation. I could never visualise something like that happening unless the employer could produce some evidence of guilt. We are going down side alleyways in trying to see how that could happen. If that happened and the employee on being dismissed appealed his case under the 1977 Act on a casual basis the Minister could hold the vacancy open. If the company concerned said that the individual had gone away with last week's payroll they would have to give some evidence that last week's pay roll was gone.

A prima facie case.

They would have to have some prima facie case. I cannot see how something like that could be written into a Bill such as this. It would seem to me to be legalistic in terms of legislation but it would be absolutely crazy in terms of trying to be flexible. We have entered into a lot of discussion in the past few weeks on Senator Fennell's point about how a case like this could happen and we are satisfied that it could be overcome.

I ask Senators to remember that in the 11 years of the operation of the 1977 Act there has not been the remotest difficulty, by any stretch of the imagination, on this point.

We are discussing the question of people who may be dismissed, for one reason or another, and allowing a certain period to elapse before we deal with the question of whether the dismissal was correct. On the question of a worker director ceasing to be an employee for legal or industrial reasons, it might be necessary to look at the 1977 Act and to amend it to provide for casual vacancies. This would (a) give the question of continuity its rightful place and (b) the concept of casual vacancies being written into the 1977 Act would help people to overcome their fears about it. If the 1977 Act provided that, within a specified period casual vacancies would be filled so that there would not be a permanent vacancy, that would overcome the difficulty.

I take the point the Minister is making. I do not like complicated legislation and in particular I do not like complicated labour legislation. There are enough lawyers involved in labour legislation at present and this is one of the things that is pulling it to pieces. It was never meant to be that way. I take the general point about not wanting to complicate legislation and I accept it.

What the Minister is saying — I am attempting to put words in his mouth — is that a Minister would be prepared to become involved in a situation where it was felt there was something precipitate about the dismissal and, therefore, it would be within the power of the Minister to hold over the dismissal to allow the person to continue as a worker director. Is that the sense of what the Minister is saying? Can the Minister intervene to say: "I would like that worker director to remain as a director in this company for the moment despite the fact that he or she has been dismissed"? Is the Minister saying he has power to do that under the 1977 Act and that a Minister would be prepared to do that if the prima facie evidence indicated that he should? I would like to have a clear understanding of that point.

I do not know if a Minister could leave a worker director on the board when he had been dismissed and the case was going on. In the case of a casual vacancy the Minister can hold that position open. In a case where a person was hard done by the Minister could say there was a doubt or there was no prima facie evidence and the Minister would involve himself in the case. If a case like this were to arise it would be fairly clear from the outset whether it was a straightforward dismissal. It would be controversial in the first place. I believe a Minister would become involved unless it was a clear case like the misuse of funds, which was mentioned earlier. A Minister could hold a position open.

I thank the Minister for clarifying the position. I would like to think we could be sure that the worker directors would be totally aware of the 1977 Act, I think as, the Minister has said, they most likely would be aware of it. It is such an unusual happening that one should not make the legislation so complex and difficult. I understand the difficulty we would have in framing legislation to make provision for this.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment No. 9 not moved.
Section 12 agreed to.
SECTION 13.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Amendments Nos. 10 and 11 are related and may be discussed together.

I move amendment No. 10:

In page 11, lines 47 to 49 and in page 12, lines 1 to 6, to delete paragraph (d).

This relates to the number of hours people have to be employed for before being eligible to vote. The Bill defines "employee as a person employed for not less than 18 hours per week. Most people realise that a number of workers, particularly women cleaners and men who work on a casual basis, are working less than 18 hours a week. The Bill states that even though you are part and parcel of the company you cannot be considered an "employee" unless you work 18 hours per week. I know we are not at war but in wartime the man who made the ammunition was equally as important as the man who fired the gun. You could not have fired the gun without ammunition. You cannot run an industry without having the person who employs people on a casual basis for less than 18 hours. They are overlooked when decisions are taken at board level or sub-board level in a participative way. They have no voting rights to vote people on to those boards and they are being discriminated against. For that reason this amendment should be accepted.

Section 13 (d) refers to employees working a specified number of hours and provides that persons employed by Aer Linte will be regarded as employees of Aer Lingus. This is making the legislation highly legalistic and complicated. It specifically refers to a particular company, which the Minister said on previous sections was undesirable. It meets the point suggested by Senator Fennell because she is talking about employees. If you remove all words referring to employees working less than 18 hours, it will achieve the same objective. I do not mind which amendment the Minister accepts. But ours is cleaner as it removes all references to employees working less than 18 hours.

This is a serious issue. If we look back over the Second Stage debate we will find that most Senators referred to the fact that people who are working under 18 hours per week do not qualify to vote. I made the point on Second Stage that I was concerned, particularly because many of these workers are women. More women work permanent short hours than men. The figures are 43,800 women to 13,900 men. Effectively we are excluding a range of workers, contract workers working a short week and under 18 hours, and excluding numbers of women who are already excluded from selection to State and semi-State boards. I regret that no Government have done anything about this. We see notices of board appointments and there is not one woman on them. It means that women remain invisible at this level.

The way this legislation is now drafted is going to further consolidate this exclusion. I ask the Minister to consider the points made and take account of the fact that there are no implications for social welfare, or finance, or any other area. All during my political life I have been dogged by this issue of the 18 hour threshold and in this legislation I cannot see any reason for it. We could suggest bringing it down to 14 hours or 12 hours but, for the purposes of an election, the Minister should do away with it and give all workers the right to vote in these elections.

It is unfortunate that yesterday was International Women's Day and here we are today taking another step backwards. I accept that it is unintentional but it is a step in the wrong direction. It is a regressive move. The points outlined by Senator Fennell indicate that this is very much an anti-woman section. I know it was not deliberately presented as that but, nevertheless, through serendipity or whatever, it turns out to be yet another discriminatory piece of legislation. Over the past ten or 12 years in terms of legislation the Department have been a most progressive Department of State. I do not believe this fits in with the spirit of much of the previous legislation particularly the equality legislation of 1977 and onwards. It is unfortunate that the effect of this will be to exclude from voting many, many women who are working in the more menial jobs in certain industries. That is one reason.

The other reason that labour legislation has depended on 18 hours being worked per week. I can see in other labour legislation an argument that can be put forward for the 18 hours. I can see reasons for doing it. It is mentioned in other places in legislation and, while I do not agree with it, I can see a case for it because of financial and social implications, and otherwise. I see no sound reason whatsoever for excluding persons from voting by virtue of the fact that they do not work more than 18 hours per week in the company. If the Minister said he did not think people in casual employment should have a vote, I could see many good logistical reasons why that should be the case. You do not know whether the person is going to be in employment this week, next week, next month or whenever. You would then have to start defining a minimum period of employment before you could enfranchise a person.

What the Minister could do without any problem at all would be to say that all permanent employees of the company or industry should be enfranchised. If they are permanently employed they should have a vote. I cannot see a reason why the Minister would disallow that. I can see three very good reasons why the Minister should change this legislation. Let me say immediately that I think it is right that an employee should be defined in the Act. I agree with that concept. Therefore, I have some difficulty with the Labour Party amendment. I would like to have terminology cleared up within the legislation. Therefore, I would like to see the term "employee" defined. That is not in conflict with the spirit of what is put forward by the Labour Party or by the Fine Gael Party in these amendments. First, if you are working in a permanent capacity in a company, even if it is only for ten hours a week, you are in a permanent position and therefore, you should have a vote.

Second, it is time we extended labour legislation when we can do it without any financial implications, without any detrimental implications to the company, to those who are working less than 18 hours. That would be a first and important progressive step. Third, I believe that, in terms of the involvement and participation of women and women workers, this could be a vital piece of legislation. The very fact of having to make a decision in the casting of a vote, or conversely the fact of not having to make a decision on who is going to be elected to represent you as a director is important. The fact of being excluded from participation means you are excluded from all the literature being distributed about the company during the process of the election, and any meetings where it is being discussed are irrelevant to you. You are excluded from any involvement in the actual process of the election which is a learning and an educative process as well as a functional one.

We are excluding women workers who are, in the main, in this group from all these things. We are excluding them from the participation of casting their vote, from the participation of learning about the company which they would certainly do through the process of a worker director election. We are also excluding them from participation at meetings with their fellow workers, becoming part of the scene and participating with them. The whole theme of equality nowadays, a Chathaoirligh, in terms of women workers is the theme of participation. I certainly know from discussions with the women's committee of ICTU, and with various women's groups, that they believe this legislation inadvertently but, nevertheless, very definitely, discrimates against women in the workforce.

They are being discriminated against in many other ways. I have looked at surveys which have come through in the past number of years showing the numbers of women in various jobs and various promoted positions in many unions including my own. Very many groups and unions in the workplaces have tried to facilitate the involvement of women. In a sense they almost positively discriminate in favour of women. That is not what I am proposing here. I am saying that many have gone as far as that. I ask the Minister to take on board this particular case, to roll back the tide and open up the procedure and get all workers involved and not let them feel excluded. That is the case I am putting forward.

The final case I put to the Minister, which I put in a very emotive way, is that very often people who are not working 18 hours a week want to work 18 hours a week. They want permanent work and they suffer the frustration of not being in full time employment. They are suffering from a sense of being unproductive and of not being able to be part of the workforce in the way they want to be — in a lesser way the problems the unemployed suffer. We have all tried over the past number of years to reach out to those who are unemployed and to try to assure them that they are part of Ireland as much as anybody else, that we are not blaming them for being unemployed and that we are not going to take a stand against them for being unemployed. Similarly I am saying that those who are working for less than 18 hours a week are very often not doing so by choice. This is not the issue. Even if they were doing it by choice, my first three arguments still stand. But those who are not doing it by choice, those who wish to be in permanent employment, are again being excluded from the process. I do not think there is a strong argument for doing that.

Let me take amendments Nos. 10, 11 and 13 together. Regarding amendment No. 10, I understand what Senator Harte has said. The effect of the amendment as worded, if we accepted it, would be to turn the definition of "employee" contained in this Bill back to the 1977 Act which is a more restrictive definition than what is in this Bill. I know from what he has said that that is not what he intended. It would have serious implications for the electorate, particularly in An Post, and Telecom Éireann which up to now have operated under the 18 hours specified in the definition of "employee". The effect of the Senator's amendment would be to remove the 18 hours specified and then you would be back to being a full time employee. That would preclude at least 600 people in An Post who would lose the franchise and perhaps about 100 in Telecom Éireann. That amendment as worded would not be good.

A lot of what Senator Fennell and Senator O'Toole said — and many others — is something that I would have liked in better times to be in a position to do. I would have liked to do something for part time workers and to try to bring in progressive legislation for part time workers. The position now is that since 1983 there is a general provision in the insolvency legislation specifying 18 hours. That is a standard provision in the legislation. That standard provision will hold in all legislation regardless of whether there is a financial provision up or down until the board question is addressed. I would not for one minute argue against any of the arguments as I think the issue has to be faced. We have to be sensible about it and say that in doing this there may be financial repercussions but on the other hand, there are many good reasons why it should be done. I am not going to argue against things I believe in but am not in a position to implement. I do not want to beat down arguments with which I might have a lot of sympathy.

We are arguing in this legislation for an improvement on the position in 1977 which would have allowed only full time people — those working 35 hours per week — and we are now bringing it down to 18 hours. That is a general provision. There is no point in people arguing that it is a general principle. If the time specified in the definition was to be changed in any one Bill, it would involve dealing with the Department's of Finance and Social Welfare and other Departments. I cannot accept the amendment in this case. I said in the Dáil recently at Question time, and I will be saying it again tomorrow, that the question of the part time workers is something that we, as a progressive Department of Labour, are concerned with. However, quite frankly I cannot do it in this Bill.

I very much regret the Minister's stance. I know he is not patronising or anything like that. We would love if he would take that large step he referred to on temporary staff as it is very badly needed. I ask the Minister to take a small step towards equality and to do something for those people in this Bill. I heard all the arguments which the Minister has just made. I am sorry but I do not think they are valid, particularly in the context of this Bill because we are not talking about cost, we are not talking about social welfare, we are not talking about giving a group of people who have been disenfranchised in so many areas, the possibility of listening to a campaign, taking an interest in a canvass when the worker director is being appointed and playing their role in it. I honestly do not think there will be any repercussions. I know the world will not fall on the Minister's head. It is only a very small thing. I know the Minister is committed to it and very motivated in this area. I ask the Minister to have the courage to go and do it.

I agree completely with what Senator Fennell has just said. I do not believe that to change the definition of "employee" for the purposes of this Bill would have repercussions on other labour legislation. I just do not believe that. This Bill can define an "employee" for its own purposes. Earlier I said one of the reasons I had some reservations about the Labour Party amendment was that it took out of the Bill the definition of an "employee". Perhaps Senator Fennell's proposal covers the Minister's arguments because it defines an employee whereas, if it were not defined, it could certainly be argued that all our labour legislation has made clear what an employee is. Unless we define an "employee" as being different from previous definitions the Minister's argument would stand. We could have a definition here that for the purposes of this Act an "employee" shall be any person permanently employed. There are no financial implications. It is an olive branch that will cost nothing.

There is no reason in the world why the Minister could not take this on board and make it part of the legislation. He would be doing a fine days work in taking this on right now. I appeal to him to have a rethink on this one. It would not cost the State money. It would not act to the detriment of any company or any industry. It involves more people, it widens participation; it is progressive legislation; it is pro-equality. Everything about it is positive. I do not think the Minister can ask us to walk away from this amendment, without making some gesture towards it. The Minister has outlined how he feels. One feels badly about making an argument to the Minister on points with which he agrees. Nevertheless we are really trying to push the Minister on this one to see what can be done, or how the Minister can move when it does not have either legal or financial implications.

We will withdraw our amendment and support Senator Fennell's amendment. The points Senator O'Toole has made are absolutely correct. On balance, having regard to the full implications of the removal of the paragraph, I feel the other amendment is more appropriate. I also believe that if we want to make progress with regard to equality the Minister should make some concession. I would be prepared to support that amendment up to the point of a vote.

I want to reiterate what Senator Harte has said. We are both responding positively to what the Minister suggested, that our amendment would mean the removal of the whole section and reverting to the 1977 definition of an employee. Was there a legal opinion available to the Minister to confirm that? We are of the opinion, in the interests of fair play and particularly as it relates to the majority of women in disadvantaged jobs, that for the purposes of this Bill anybody who is employed in a company should be covered by the Act. Senator Fennell's amendment suggests: "any person employed". We feel there is justification for all persons employed being represented by worker directors and participating to the full in any election taking place.

It is not unreasonable, and there is no cost factor involved. The Minister could take a major step forward in the treatment of people who feel disadvantaged and, unfortunately, the majority are women. It would be a major step forward if the Minister accepted this amendment. To facilitate the House, we will withdraw our amendment in favour of Senator Fennell's amendment. We hope the Minister will concede it without a vote.

I listened with interest to the points made, and, of course, there is a lot of validity in them. Could I just pose a question? Leaving sex out of it, is it fair that a person who works a standard week — let us say a person who works five or ten hours hours a week part time — should have equal rights in terms of voting?

The Vineyard.

Yes. I think so.

We are getting biblical now. It has rightly been put on the record that the Minister's intentions are not anti-woman. That is not the intention. It is just that the whole range of social legislation in this area applies to a minimum number of hours of 18 a week. Could I point out to Senator Fennell that this was actually introduced by an administration in which she was a Minister. That is not to score a party political point but it was actually introduced by a Labour Minister in the last Coalition.

I sympathise with the Minister's intention in relation to part time employment. It is a fact that in western society, in particular, there has been a continuous growth in part time employment and these people do not have the same range of benefits that full time employees do. With the trend of unemployment, with technological changes, and so forth, we want to have a further increase in part time employment in the labour force rather than the reverse. The indications are that way in the western democracies. I fully subscribe to the Minister's desire to be alert to the need for protection where possible for part time workers. That is a very big question and there are costs involved. I sympathise with the fact that there are so many women in part time employment because they have no choice other than to be part time employees. A sizeable number of women, married women in particular, choose to work part time because they want simultaneously to cope with their domestic and family responsibilities as well as taking part time work. For them it is often a very attractive compromise to be able to do both. That is the reality in relation to that point.

I again make the point: should a person who works a very small number of hours a week in employment have the same voting rights on this issue, irrespective of sex, as a person who works, say, 40 hours a week?

I thank Senator Hillery for that. He has a reputation for being an emancipated man, in favour of women's rights, but I suggest to him that we would not be really talking about somebody working five hours a week — that is going to the other extreme — because we are talking about anybody employed under a contract of service or apprenticeship under the provisions of sections 9 and 10 of this Bill. We are not talking about people as casual as that. It is an issue of women: it happens that women are in a glut; they are all caught in that net of part time work. So, much as we would like to think it is not women who are affected, I am afraid it is — it is a matter of gender.

In his Second Stage speech, Senator Hillery dealt with the emergence of a two-tier employment status. It is regrettable if that is the case because the protection and security of a part time worker bear absolutely no relation to a full time worker. If we have to cope with that in the interim, until things get better, we must recognise that the part time worker has needs and we have obligations to meet those needs. Whatever way you argue it, we have to do something about this legislation. I would like to think that the Minister will go away and think about it, or in some way facilitate us on Report Stage, but I have to say that I feel very strongly about this one and I am representing the views of many workers who could not make it.

I apologise for intruding, having just come into the House, but I rushed here in the hope that I would be in time to support this amendment because I feel that Senator Fennell has put the case very well for her amendment. There is no doubt that in cases on discrimination, as the Minister will be aware, the European Court of Justice, for example, has been prepared to consider that if it can be established that a significantly higher proportion of part time jobs are held by women, or married women, whatever the group may be, that could constitute discrimination. It is a pattern in the Irish workplace that a very significant number of women are in part time jobs for reasons we all know very well and do not have to spell out.

It is extremely important in legislation of this kind, where we are talking about increasing the participation of workers, that we do not perpetuate a discrimination against a certain category of worker, a very significant proportion of whom would be women workers. Therefore, I would like to support the amendment in the name of Senator Fennell and, indeed, the amendments tabled to this section along the same lines.

Senator Hillery, as usual, jogged my memory on two points which I had intended to make when I was on my feet. I dealt with the labour legislation, the threshold of 18 hours and the question of women, that it should be permanent employment, but he reminded me once again of whoever this anonymous person in Europe was who some day took somebody over from the IMI and showed him this flow chart of the new industry of the 21st century, which showed a little core, with satellites, of part time workers all round it, and he reminded me once again that this is the direction in which industry feels it should be moving in and, if I can do anything about it, will not be moving in. Seeing that they are in the power bloc at the moment, they are intending to create more part time workers than ever before. There is a growth, as Senator Hillery quite rightly pointed out, in the number of part time workers. There is a growth in the number of people who are not working full time in a particular industry because of this system of employment, of companies now just doing their core activity and perhaps contracting out other smaller parts of their operations which they do not see as the core part.

Therefore, we are moving towards disenfranchising people, particularly at a time when we are looking at our semi-State companies moving into other areas. We talked earlier about Aer Lingus moving into many different fields. Legislation will be coming to this House shortly which will allow the ESB to extend their range of activities and there will be more and more of that available as a more enlightened Government see to it that semi-State industry and State industry are allowed to develop. This will certainly be happening.

A critical point coming from the Department of Labour is the concept of job sharing. He put forward the concept of job sharing as something that should be considered and looked at, and implemented where possible. In many cases, the job sharing of a 38-hour week or a 37-hour week will be excluding the participants from the franchise in this case, so I think the whole weight of evidence is against what is happening here, particularly when the Minister does not believe any of it himself. We know where his heart is and we ask him in this case to follow his heart and make the move we are looking for in this area.

We have held out an olive branch to the Minister. We have given him this opportunity before he finally responds. If a vote is called for on this amendment it might be misrepresented and it might be suggested that he is anti-woman, and we know he is not anti-woman. From reading his recent article we know he is a very pro-woman but he dos not give enough time to her. Senator Fennell has said we will give the Minister between now and Report Stage to think again. I think his heart is with us. We are anxious to facilitate him and we could reactivate our amendment to facilitate at least one vote if we want to. We would rather not have a vote so perhaps he will agree with what we have been saying and tell us he will come back to us on Report Stage with a suggested wording to overcome some of the problems highlighted here and to which he has addressed himself as well.

I have been holding out olive branches all evening to my colleagues and to the Senators on the Independent side and they have all been accepted. I explained some of the reasons but I will go back over some of the issues again. Can I say to my friends in the Labour Party that I was tempted, almost, to accept their amendment and have the full time capacity as the provision but because a number of other Senators feel we should not keep it at 37 or 38 hours, I brought it down by 20 hours to 18. I am glad Senators have accepted that it is at least half right. Having tried to get me at 37 or 38 hours and bringing it down to 18, now the Senators want me to go down to nil. I know that was not their intention.

Senator Fennell probably understands. In Government she fought the arguments and I would not take away from that for one minute. I have heard her as Minister with responsibility for Women's Affairs make the same strong speeches as she did today, but she is aware of the difficulties in changing this. I said that I accept all the advantages of it. If Report Stage was taken in a few years time perhaps I could come back with a favourable amendment.

The people we are talking about — this is not an excuse because I want to take this one face on — are primarily in the private sector and this Bill is not covering the private sector but the public sector. There is some information available. I am not being vague about it. Out of a staff of nearly 8,500 An Post have only 59 females affected. In Bord Telecom there are only 124 out of approximately 30,000 people working who work fewer than 18 hours. In Aer Lingus there are no casuals except the people who are taken on in the summer, but they would be different. In Bord na Móna there is none. In the B & I there is none. In NET there is none. In the ESB there is none. In the sugar company there is none except the campaign workers who are taken on. In CIE there are one or two small categories. Aer Rianta have only the casual workers who are taken on during the summer, and in NRB only three or four. As far as this legislation is concerned I could be arguing that there is no particular relevance. People in job sharing pay totally different insurance and so forth. I do not want to get into that area — but there is an answer to that, too.

I am slightly amused at the fact that earlier I got great accolades and praise and almost bouquets when I excluded all the part time workers in the subsidiaries of Aer Lingus. What we were doing at that stage was keeping the Aer Lingus position nice and tidy and safe. We excluded en bloc all the part time workers in all of the subsidiaries of Aer Lingus from that legislation. We did that with all the support and the accolades I received for it.

What we are doing in this Bill is keeping in line with all the other legislation. I have accepted the arguments that there are difficulties in the whole area of part time workers. I accept the point made by Senator Fennell that we are not talking about one hour, two hours, five hours or six hours; it could be ten hours. That is a debate which involves all the legislation and all the various issues, Social Welfare, Finance and a very strong input by the Department of Labour. It is not a debate to amend this legislation — things cannot be done in that way. I know Senators are serious about the debate. I take their points on board, but they are points for another day. The issue of part time workers which this amendment appears to address has implications beyond the scope of the proposals before the House. I ask Senators to accept that. I accepted their points of view on other issues which were not beyond the scope of this Bill.

There has been considerable discussion in recent times concerning the appropriate definition of part time workers. The provisions of the Bill are merely catching up. I am not trying to cater for part time workers in this legislation. I accept that is an issue which has to be addressed. I hope I will still be Minister for Labour when the time comes for that.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

I move amendment No. 11:

In page 11, line 39 and in page 12, lines 1 and 2, to delete "a person employed for not less than 18 hours per week by the body" and substitute "any person employed".

Question put: "That the words proposed to be deleted stand."
The Committee divided: Tá, 24; Níl, 19.

  • Bohan, Edward Joseph.
  • Byrne, Sean.
  • Cullimore, Séamus.
  • de Buitléar, Éamon.
  • Doherty, Michael.
  • Eogan, George.
  • Fallon, Seán.
  • Farrell, Willie.
  • Fitzgerald, Tom.
  • Fitzsimons, Jack.
  • Hanafin, Des.
  • Haughey, Seán F.
  • Hillery, Brian.
  • Hussey, Thomas.
  • Lanigan, Mick.
  • McEllistrim, Tom.
  • McGowan, Patrick.
  • McKenna, Tony.
  • Mooney, Paschal.
  • Mulroy, Jimmy.
  • O'Callaghan, Vivian.
  • Ó'Conchubhair, Nioclás.
  • Ryan, William.
  • Wallace, Mary.

Níl

  • Bradford, Paul.
  • Bulbulia, Katharine.
  • Connor, John.
  • Daly, Jack.
  • Doyle, Joe.
  • Fennell, Nuala.
  • Ferris, Michael.
  • Harte, John.
  • Kennedy, Patrick.
  • McCormack, Padraic.
  • McDonald, Charlie.
  • McMahon, Larry.
  • Manning, Maurice.
  • O'Shea, Brian.
  • O'Toole, Joe.
  • Reynolds, Gerry.
  • Robinson, Mary T.W.
  • Ross, Shane P.N.
  • Ryan, Brendan.
Tellers: Tá, Senators W. Ryan and S. Haughey; Níl, Senators J. Daly and Bradford.
Question declared carried.
Amendment declared lost.
Section 13 agreed to.
SECTION 14.
Government amendment No. 12:
In page 12, line 32, to delete "B+I Line public limited company", and to substitute "B & I Line public limited company".

This amendment has already been discussed with amendment No. 6.

Amendment agreed to.

I move amendment No. 13:

In page 12, lines 35 and 36, to delete "and the Electricity Supply Board" and substitute ", the Electricity Supply Board and Bord Gáis Éireann".

This amendment has already been discussed with amendment No. 6.

I want to make a final appeal to the Minister regarding the wording.

The Senator cannot discuss this any more. It is a question as to whether the amendment is pressed or withdrawn.

I got confused about the procedure because of the lumping together of a number of amendments. I apologise for this. The amendment is not being pressed.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendments Nos. 14 and 15 not moved.
Government amendment No. 16:
In page 12, between lines 42 and 43, to insert the following subparagraph: "(vi) with regard to An Post and Bord Telecom Eireann, the Minister for Communications;".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 17 not moved.
Section 14, as amended, agreed to.
Sections 15 to 20, inclusive, agreed to.
SECTION 21.
Government amendment No. 18:
In page 16, between lines 14 and 15, to insert the following subparagraph:
"(g) section 16 (2) (a) of the Postal and Telecommunications Services Act, 1983;".
Amendment agreed to.
Section 21, as amended, agreed to.
Sections 22 and 23 agreed to.
SECTION 24.

I move amendment No. 19:

In page 17, between lines 9 and 10, to insert the following:

"Radio Telefís Éireann Voluntary Health Insurance Board Eolas — The Irish Science and Technology Agency Teagaisc".

There is an anomaly here inasmuch as in the Schedules we have included An Foras Talúntais and ACOT which are to be amalgamated.

This amendment has already been discussed with amendment No. 6.

Amendment put.

Senators

Vótáil.

The question is: "That the amendment be made". On that question a division has been challenged. Will those Senators calling for a division please rise in their places?

Senators Ferris, Harte, J. O'Toole, O'Shea and B. Ryan stood.

The division will now proceed.

The Committee divided: Tá, 16; Níl, 22.

  • Bradford, Paul.
  • Bulbulia, Katharine.
  • Connor, John.
  • Daly, Jack.
  • Fennell, Nuala.
  • Ferris, Michael.
  • Kelleher, Peter.
  • McCormack, Padraic.
  • McDonald, Charlie.
  • McMahon, Larry.
  • Manning, Maurice.
  • O'Shea, Brian.
  • O'Toole, Joe.
  • Robinson, Mary T.W.
  • Ross, Shane, P.N.
  • Ryan, Brendan.

Níl

  • Bohan, Edward Joseph.
  • Byrne, Sean.
  • Doherty, Michael.
  • Eogan, George.
  • Fallon, Sean.
  • Farrell, Willie.
  • Fitzgerald, Tom.
  • Fitzsimons, Jack.
  • Hanafin, Des.
  • Haughey, Seán F.
  • Hillery, Brian.
  • Hussey, Tomas.
  • Lanigan, Mick.
  • McEllistrim, Tom.
  • McGowan, Patrick.
  • McKenna, Tony.
  • Mooney, Paschal.
  • Mulroy, Jimmy.
  • O'Callaghan, Vivian.
  • O Conchubhair, Nioclás.
  • Ryan, William.
  • Wallace, Mary.
Tellers: Tá, Senators Ferris and O'Shea; Níl, Senators W. Ryan and S. Haughey.
Amendment declared lost.
Government amendment No. 20:
In page 17, to delete lines 11 to 15, and to substitute the following:
"Aer Lingus public limited company
Aer Rianta cuideachta phoiblí theoranta
An Post
B & I Line public limited company
Bord Telecom Éireann
Siúicre Éireann cuideachta phoiblí theoranta
Nítrigin Éireann Teoranta".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 21, not moved.
Government amendment No. 22:
In page 17, line 20, to delete "An Post".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 23 and 24 not moved.
Government amendment No. 25:
In page, 17, line 26, to delete "Bord Telecom Éireann".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 26 and 27 not moved.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Government amendments Nos. 28 and 30 are related and may be discussed together.

Government amendment No. 28:
In page 17, between lines 34 and 35, to insert "Great Southern Hotels Limited".

With regard to the Great Southern Hotels Limited the certificate of incorporation in relation to the change of name is effective from 15 February 1988 so all we seek to do is to formalise the change of the name in the Bill.

Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 29 not moved.
Government amendment No. 30:
In page 17, line 41, to delete "Óstlanna Iompair Éireann".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 31 and 32 not moved.
Government amendment No. 33:
In page 18, to delete lines 5 to 12, and to substitute the following:
"Aer Lingus public limited company
Aer Rianta cuideachta phoiblí theoranta
An Post
B & I Line public limited company
Bord na Móna
Bord Telecom Éireann
Córas Iompair Éireann
Electricity Supply Board
Siúicre Éireann cuideachta phoiblí theoranta
Nítrigin Éireann Teoranta".
Amendment agreed to.
Amendment No. 34 not moved.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Amendment No. 35 has already been discussed with amendment No. 6. Does the Senator wish to press the amendment?

Amendment No. 35 not moved.
Question proposed: "That section 24, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Bearing in mind that An Foras Talúntais and ACOT are included in the Schedules to the Bill and that the Bill has already been circulated setting Teagasc, I am seeking a specific assurance from the Minister that when Teagasc has been set up by the two Houses of the Oireachtas he will include Teagasc in the Schedules to the Act.

One of the reasons we called a vote on the amendment was that we hoped to include Teagasc in the amendment which was circulated, which included the two previous organisations AFT and ACOT. As these are proposed to be abolished by the Government and amalgamated as one we were amazed to find that this new proposed organisation was not included in the Schedule.

Now that we are allowing this section to go through a further vote, we need an assurance from the Minister that he will advise the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Deputy O'Kennedy, of this House's wish to have the new amalgamated body, when it is set up, listed in the companies that will be involved in worker participation. That is the minimum we can ask for today. The workers in the two existing boards who will be remaining on in the amalgamated board need an assurance that this House is in favour of the principle of worker participation in the new board.

As yet the body proposed to be known as Teagasc has no legal existence and to include it in the Bill will not be possible at this Stage. I am sure the Senator accepts that. The Department of Agriculture and Food have indicated that Teagasc will be included in the sub-board provisions of the Bill in place of ACOT and An Foras Talúntais in due course. That is the provision.

Question put and agreed to.
Section 25 agreed to.
NEW SECTION.
Government amendment No. 36:
In page 19, before section 26, to insert in the following section:
26.—Sections 34 and 35 of, and Part I of the First Schedule to, the Postal and Telecommunications Services Act, 1983, are hereby repealed.".
Amendment agreed to.
Section 26 agreed to.
Title agreed to.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Next Stage?

I was not aware that we were going to take Report Stage now.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

It is a matter for the House.

I was not aware that we were going on to Report Stage. We made various sugestions to the Minister that he might consider other aspects which had been the subject of controversy during this Stage and we were allowing him some time. There was no consultation with the Labour Party about Report Stage being taken now. It is a matter for the House. We do not want to obstruct the Bill because basically we are in favour of it. We are trying to improve it.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

It is entirely a matter for the House although from the run of the debate there were some questions raised which would indicate taking Report Stage now.

It would be appropriate to have time, if the Minister does not mind, between now and Report Stage. We are also anxious to facilitate the Minister.

There is a general desire to have this legislation processed as quickly as possible. After all, it was initiated in the Seanad and it still has to go through the various Stages in a busy Dáil. I would have thought, unless there is something particularly pressing, that it should proceed today but, as the Leas-Chathaoirleach points out, that is a matter for agreement.

I feel some time is required for discussion on a number of sections. Although I accept the need for speed and efficiency it would be more appropriate if we had Report Stage on another day.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

Is that agreed?

Report Stage ordered for Wednesday, 16 March 1987.
Sitting suspended at 5.55 p.m. and resumed at 6.30 p.m.
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