Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 23 February 2023
70. Deputy Louise O'Reilly asked the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if he has read a report (details supplied); if he has plans to amend the Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2018 to ensure where extra hours are available that longer term workers seeking additional hours are prioritised; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9181/23]
View answerI welcome the new Minister and Ministers of State. It seems perhaps that I am the only consistent Member in the enterprise portfolio.
Deputy Calleary has been around here before.
I welcome any Member who is here for the first time. My question is straightforward and it relates to the Mandate Trade Union report, Smoke and Mirrors: The Facts About Retail Workers' Incomes in Ireland. Has the Minister any plans to amend the Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2018 to ensure where extra hours are available longer-term workers seeking additional hours are prioritised?
I thank the Deputy for her kind welcome. Consistency is not a bad thing in life.
From the outset, I can confirm that I have read Mandate's report, Smoke and Mirrors: The Facts About Retail Workers' Incomes in Ireland. Indeed, Mandate raised it with me directly when I met them a week prior to its publication. We had a discussion then and we have had subsequent discussions via email and telephone before and after the launch. I look forward to continuing to work closely with them on this report and other issues relating to the retail sector and its employees in the coming weeks.
I know this is an area of particular interest to the Deputy. She has much professional experience in this, as well as legislative experience, and we are more than willing to take this experience on board. At the end of the day, we all want to see the retail sector thrive and the workers happy with their hours, pay and conditions.
The Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2018 came into force on 4 March 2019, with the purpose of strengthening employee rights and addressing the problems caused by an increased casualisation of work. Among other measures, zero-hour contracts were banned and a banded hours system was introduced, where workers can request to be placed on a contract that better reflects their working hours. It is important to note in light of the Mandate report the current legislation does not prohibit increases in the number of hours an employee can work. If they are working increased hours, employees may request to be placed on a higher band.
In addition to the 2018 Act, the Deputy will be aware Ireland also has in place a code of practice on access to part-time work. The code was drawn up by the then Labour Relations Commission pursuant to the 2001 Act. Among other provisions, the code of practice sets out that, as far as possible, employers should give consideration to a request by workers to transfer from part-time to full-time work or to increase their working time should the opportunity arise.
I also assure Deputy O'Reilly that my Department closely monitors national and international developments and relevant case law from the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, the Labour Court and the High Court. On that basis, I have written to the WRC requesting that it reviews both the code of practice on part-time work and the Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2018 to assess the overall effectiveness of the suite of protections for part-time workers. It is timely that a comprehensive review of both the code and the Act of 2018 is carried out now.
It is clear that while the code of practice was very well intentioned and is a decent piece of work, it is not working. Mandate is telling us nearly two thirds of retail workers are earning less than €451 per week. That is not even getting within a million miles of anything that would be a living wage. I attended the launch of the report where some of the workers from the shop floor spoke. They say that sometimes hours are used as a mechanism almost to control workers. For example, if you happen to be the shop steward, the person who is handing out the union membership forms, or the person who is seeking a meeting with management because you are not happy with how things go, all of a sudden you will find yourself at the lower end of the bands.
When the banded hours legislation came in, it did not have everything in it that Mandate looked for or that we looked for. However, everybody accepted it was a very good place to start. I welcome the Minister of State's words. Now is the time for a review, but I ask for that to be done quickly. We are in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis and these are among the lowest-paid workers in any sector in any industry. The message that is coming very clearly from the report, Smoke and Mirrors: The Facts About Retail Workers' Incomes in Ireland, is that they are struggling.
The review will be quick, but most importantly it will be thorough. We are dealing with legislation that was described as groundbreaking by Mandate when it was introduced. We owe it the duty of care to make sure there is a thorough review that addresses real, statistical issues. The report is very welcome and there is a lot of interesting data in it, but it must also be looked at in the round. It states that 60% of workers do not actually want extra hours, and of the 40% who do, only 20% are denied those hours by their manager. This means that only 8% of those surveyed were declined these hours by a manager.
Statistics from the WRC do not show that there is a huge issue with the banded hours, but we do need to review the legislation and we will do that in good spirit, taking on board the report and taking on board the comments the Deputy has made this morning, as well as those of employer groups who meet us through various fora, such as the retail forum etc.
There is not a massive amount of difference between the Minister of State and me on this. However, the Mandate survey is for unionised workers. As everybody knows, the best bet you have for getting a decent rate of pay is to join your union and be active in it. These are unionised workers. Again, the WRC very often sees unionised workers. If it is bad for workers who are unionised and who are engaged with their union, we can only imagine what it is like for workers who do not have that collective voice to speak up for them at work. It is fair to say that the sector is over-represented in terms of low pay. It is not so much the low pay, but the way the hours are used. Anyone who has ever worked in shift work on an hourly rate will know that even with the banded hours, one week you might be at top of the band and the next week you are down. You cannot plan when you are trying to live like that. Now is the time. When the legislation was debated a commitment was given that this issue of the hours being distributed would be looked at. I welcome that that is now being done.
Very briefly, there is not much difference here between the Deputy and me, which is welcome. The workers will appreciate that politicians from all corners are here to try to get better conditions for them and to work with employers to make it sustainable. There is not low pay in the retail sector, because the average is €17 per hour, but there is an issue with hours. That is something we can address. The salary rates are set, the employers are doing a good job and they are engaging with the unions. The workers are making solid representations and we see that coming back through the very few cases that are being brought to the WRC. The review will go on and it will be done in a timely and thorough manner most importantly.
