Any Minister who has had the job of presiding over a spending Department will know how frustrating it is to save money only to find it clawed back by the Minister for Finance at the end of the year and then to have to fight the battle to get it back again. It makes for very bad planning, inefficient spending and frequently forces Departments into over speedy spending of money that they might not want to spend but they know that if they do not spend it by 31 December they will not be able to roll it over into the next year. They have to fight for it again and, very frequently, lose it. As a result the decision in respect of many projects that has been approved, and the approval notified to the people concerned, is reversed in the following year. In my view the three year period of the Programme for National Recovery should be extended to the annual budgeting of the Department of Finance and of the Government.
The Minister for Labour has been playing down the possibility of another three year agreement and playing up the difficulties. I do not blame him for that, that is his job. There will be difficulties. I would like to make it clear that we in this party, the main Opposition party, feel that the three year format is very good for the country, for the people generally and for trade union members. It helps to bring certainty and to eliminate a lot of difficulties. It helps industry and it will help job creation provided that the parameters of the agreement are right. The format accepted in 1987 involving all the partners in the NESC should be further developed so that key matters not possible by way of plant bargaining should be taken into account. I have in mind income tax and PRSI which can directly affect take home pay and also the question of means testing and other post-pay packet State interventions which can affect the relative value of take home pay, for instance, differential rent, mortgage assistance, etc., State interventions that happen after you get your pay packet and which can affect the actual disposable income of a worker. I hope that in future agreements in the NESC format these factors can also be taken into account.
The national agreement format, however, also has serious dangers and pitfalls which must at all costs be avoided. National agreements have been used before by at least three Taoisigh, including Mr. Seán Lemass and the present Taoiseach, to hike up national pay offers in order to bring electoral popularity in advance of general elections. National agreements of that kind have been disastrous for the economy and for jobs. We would be better off with no agreement than one of that kind.
The next agreement must continue to be sub-inflationary with improvements in living standards and take home pay coming from tax concessions and from social insurance contribution adjustments. Only through low inflation can we be competitive and set the scene for job creation. Job creation must have a higher priority in the next national agreement than in the present one.
As I have said, I know there will be difficulties. The last agreement was reached in an atmosphere of crisis and that induced all the social partners to sit down together — farmers, employers, the unions and the Government — and come up with a plan to help cement economic recovery. It is defeatist to say that because the crisis has eased it has completely disappeared. It has not. It is defeatist to say that because the crisis has eased it is still not possible, not alone essential, that we have another national agreement of that sort which would equally serve the national interest as well as the interests of trade union members.
I had the privilege of being a shop steward in what was then the Workers' Union of Ireland and subsequently the Federated Workers' Union of Ireland, now merged with the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union and known as SIPTU. I have already welcomed the reemergence of OBU — one big union — and I am very glad to see the reunification of the union of Larkin and Connolly. Not only have I had a life long connection with the union and very direct personal involvement but my family's connection with the union goes back a long time. I am not saying necessarily that big is beautiful but I want to re-echo what was said in the Minister's speech, that frequently trade unions do not have the resources to provide themselves with adequate research, adequate education and adequate training. Indeed the same, if not more, could be said in that respect about political parties which are totally inadequately funded to do proper research and proper training and to engage in proper education of their people. That lack in both political parties and the trade unions can be very costly economically if people are making policy proposals or negotiating agreements, the end result of which they do not understand. For that reason and given the highly constructive role of the trade union movement, I have for long held the view that the amount of funds put at the disposal of the trade union movement by the State for research, training and education should be greatly increased. It would be a very wise investment and no more than enlightened self-interest on the part of the State.
My contribution to date has been a general reflection on the contents and omissions of the Bill. The purpose of the Bill according to the explanatory memorandum is to bring about a better framework for collective bargaining and dispute settlement by making a number of important changes in trade union law and in industrial relations law generally.
The memorandum says that the proposed changes in trade union law will tighten and clarify the law in relation to picketing, especially secondary picketing. There are different definitions of secondary picketing. I know that employers want secondary picketing banned. The Minister rejects that categoric step on the basis that workers cannot be restricted from placing a picket on any employer who would seek to deliberately subvert a strike. The whole question of secondary picketing will have to be teased out on Committee Stage. A form of secondary picketing, although not covered by the definition here, is a picket which affects employers who have no connection with the strike. That too will have to be teased out on Committee Stage.
The Bill does not deal with the case where there is a common entrance to more than one employer, for instance, in industrial estates, airports, shopping centres and so on. The Bill does not give employees the right of access to private property in order to allow them to picket the premises of their own employer in these cases. The Bill specifically says "or on approaches to." That seems to cement in law the notion that the proper place to picket any multi-employer locations is at the entrance to these locations. Therefore, a small percentage of the total workforce in a multi-employer location could picket and keep people out of work. This problem is more acute where the union concerned is a non-congress union. Where there is a congress union, at least the all out picket procedures of the congress are effective.
The explanatory memorandum says that the Bill hopes to build on existing good practice in the area of pre-strike secret ballots by providing that unions must have a rule requiring the holding of such ballots. Nobody will say that is other than a wise provision. It is a global provision that does not go into the sort of detail I would like. Nor has the Minister in his introductory speech elaborated on what he would envisage would be in codes of practice in this respect to be drawn up by the proposed commission.
There are very complex issues as to who is entitled to vote in any dispute. Take, for instance, Guinness where there are different categories of staff. Let us say that laboratory technicians belong to a small union and have a grading disput with the company and after exhaustive negotiations decide to strike. These workers represent 2 per cent of the workforce and are not members of congress. Should that picket have the same protection as a picket with the support of the majority of the workforce? These questions are not addressed in the Bill or in the Minister's introductory speech.
These issues are complex. It would be easy to say that a majority at that workplace could be expected to vote for a picket in a strike relating to their interests, but what about the rights of minorities? Minorities have rights regardless of the size of the majority. These questions have not been addressed and we will have to tease them out on Committee Stage.
I welcome the provisions which prohibit ex parte injunctions — these are injunctions which are often granted in the dead of night by a High Court Judge in chambers or at home to senior counsel for the employer, without counsel for the trade unions being present. I welcome the change in that respect but I would have gone much further. I am not convinced that the High Court is the right place to resolve industrial relations disputes. In the past there have been rigid interpretations of the law by High Court judges. We have seen workers in dispute ending up in jail, seen them sent home in taxis at the expense of the State.
Any basic reform of the industrial relations institutions proposed in this Bill or the formation of a labour relations commission and, to a certain extent, the reform of the Labour Court, should have included a mechanism whereby a legal member of the Labour Court, perhaps with the status of a High Court judge, could sit with industrial relations assessors at the appropriate tribunal or forum for dealing with injunctions or other judicial aspects of industrial relations disputes. The Bill is somewhat disppointing and unadventurous in that regard although, admittedly, they are very complex areas. In the present lull in the industrial relations storm, an opportunity has been missed to deal with these complex problems. It is very difficult to envisage times arising again which would enable these thorny issues to be grasped.
Under the trade union law provisions the Bill deals further with the rationalisation of the trade union movement. I welcome those provisions. The second part of the Bill deals with the setting up of a labour relations commission with general responsibility for the promotion of good industrial relations. The function of the commission will be to encourage and facilitate a more active approach to dispute prevention and resolution and, as a result, the original purpose and status of Labour Court investigation and recommendations will be restored.
I welcome the proposal to create a labour relations commission. However, we must be careful to lay down very clear rules and guidelines as to how the labour relations commission, the Rights Commissioners and the equality tribunal under it relate to the Labour Court.
While these provisions are very clearcut, it is vitally important that the relationships laid down are sufficiently flexible to deal with the sorts of problems which will arise from time to time. The Minister sees the Labour Court as a court of last resort rather than a court of first resort. On the other hand, the social partners — the unions and the employers — say that that should be the case except where they agree between them to go to the Labour Court. The Minister said he will not allow that even where two parties to a dispute agree to go to the Labour Court and be bound in advance by their findings. On Committee Stage we will need to further reflect on the nuances of the argument, as to whether the Minister or the social partners are right or if something in between would be more appropriate.
The Bill is not innovative in the sense that it does not look at alternative methods of dispute settlement. Very often the opening demands made by trade unions are inflated as a negotiating ploy; similarly, the opening offers of employers are reduced as an opening ploy. Very often a lot of time is wasted and bad blood is created from the hassling negotiations which then ensue.
There is an alternative way. In Canada they have a different arbitration system where, if both sides agree, the matter can go to arbitration on the basis that the finding of the arbitrator is accepted in advance. There is an additional condition that the arbitrator can decide only to adopt in full the offer of the employers or the trade union claim. The starkness of that approach induces reality from an early stage into discussions between employers and trade unions; it very often avoids the necessity for protracted and heated negotiations which often lead to bad will and sourness which can continue for a considerable time after the dispute has been resolved. Of course that would be a very major change here but it serves to highlight that there are alternative methods and options which maybe we should provide in this area of industrial relations. The Minister has chosen not to be adventurous in this respect. Perhaps on reflection it is the wiser course. I mention it in passing because it works extremely well in Canada which has a very proud industrial development record and has managed to provide for its workforce — and people generally — great prosperity.
I very much look forward to Committee Stage of the Industrial Relations Bill. I hope the Minister will be open to constructive and significant amendments because all Members have a joint interest and, generally, a joint approach to it. We do not have in this House — or in the country — the ideological split that exists in the United Kingdom. We do not have any party interested in merely promoting the interests of employers or in bashing trade unions. There is a widespread consensus that this is an area where we can do things not by ideology or heated exchanges but by discussion and negotiation.
I hope that will be the atmosphere in which Committee and Report Stages will be considered. It will certainly be my approach to the remaining Stages. I intend to table a number of substantive amendments to the Bill and to go into much greater detail as to its provisions. I hope that in the final analysis the Bill that will emerge from this House and from the Seanad, and which will be ultimately brought into law by the President, will stand the test of time, that it will improve our industrial relations on a permanent basis and, above all——
