Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 2 February 2010
125 Deputy Emmet Stagg asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if she will make a statement on the preliminary report of the National Employment Rights Authority for 2009; and her views on whether the increase in the number of prosecutions taken against employers reflects a continuing high level of breaches of the law by some employers. [4852/10]
View answerThe role of the National Employment Rights Authority (NERA) is to secure greater compliance with employment rights legislation and I welcome the fact that this is being achieved with equal emphasis on awareness raising and inspection activity and, where necessary, by pursuing prosecutions. NERA's work is essential in assisting individual workers to obtain their statutory entitlements, and to ensure that employers operate on a level playing pitch whereby no competitive advantage can be gained by undercutting workers' legal entitlements in the area of pay and conditions.
In 2009, NERA's telephone information service dealt with some 150,000 callers representing an increase of almost 31% over 2008 levels. It is interesting that some 40% of these callers were employers which would indicate a need on the part also of employers for information which NERA is very happy to provide. During 2009, NERA also took on a significant function on behalf of my Department which is that of assuming the role of answering calls from employers and employees in relation to redundancy claims. This has enabled the staff of my Department to focus on prioritising the processing of Redundancy Payment claims. NERA's website continues to provide valuable information on employment law obligations and entitlements with over 1.5 million web page impressions being recorded in 2009. I am particularly pleased that the Authority participated in 35 events organised by trade unions, employer bodies and others in order to provide information and promote awareness of employment law.
NERA's information and awareness activities are supported by monitoring and enforcement of compliance with Employment legislation in the workplace. Some 8,800 employers were inspected by NERA in 2009 involving 22,445 discrete inspections across the range of employment legislation. NERA recovered some €2.5 million in unpaid wages in total in 2009 arising from breaches of certain employment rights legislation. This brings the total recovered by NERA since its establishment in 2007 to in excess of €8 million.
In terms of prosecutions, it is important to point out that the number of cases referred for prosecution, or the number of cases that result in legal proceedings are not, in themselves, primary indicators of compliance levels. This is because in the majority of cases employers co-operate in rectifying breaches of employment law brought to their attention by NERA inspectors. Hence, reliance on legal proceedings in such cases is not necessary. However, NERA reserves the right to initiate legal proceedings, generally as a last resort, in all cases and, in 2009, 87 cases were referred for the purposes of initiating legal proceedings. This represents a very small level — just over 3% — of the total number of cases involving breaches that were closed in 2009. A further 21 referrals related to requests by the Construction Industry Monitoring Agency for the initiation of proceedings against employers who failed to comply with Labour Court orders.
NERA currently employs two primary indicators of compliance in so far as its inspection activities are concerned namely: the ratio of compliant employers to inspection cases closed and the ratio of breaches detected to the total number of discrete inspections. In this regard, some 69% of the individual employer cases closed in 2009 and 81% of individual discrete inspections did not involve a breach of employment legislation. The comparable indicators of compliance for 2008 were 77% and 79% respectively.
The incidence of breaches detected in NERA inspections under individual pieces of employment legislation also provides a useful indication of the level of compliance. Based on inspections undertaken in 2009 and 2008 the compliance rates in this regard are as set out in the table. It is NERA's intention in 2010 to continue, through proactive education and awareness programmes underpinned by the use of focused and risk-based enforcement measures, to strive for enhanced compliance with employment law.
|
Legislation under which inspection undertaken |
Compliance rate % 2009 |
Compliance rate % 2008 |
|
% |
% |
|
|
National Minimum Wage Act |
93 |
91 |
|
Payment of Wages Act |
87 |
85 |
|
Organisation of Working Time Act |
53 |
55 |
|
REAs/EROs |
38 |
33 |
|
Protection of Young Persons Act |
99 |
97 |
