Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 10 Mar 1998

Vol. 488 No. 4

Adjournment Debate. - Age Discrimination in Employment.

Mr. Gilmore

I thank you, Sir, for giving me an opportunity to raise the matter on the Adjournment and I thank the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law reform for coming into the House to respond.

The Employment Equality Bill, currently before the Seanad, will make it illegal for employers to discriminate against employees on grounds of age. This legislation will include a legal ban on advertising jobs which contain an age bar. The Amsterdam Treaty, which will shortly be put to the people in a referendum, will put a similar provision into the European treaties.

In these circumstances one would expect agencies of the State to be particularly careful not to discriminate against employees on grounds of age and not to put an age bar into advertisements for jobs. Yet State agencies continue to discriminate on grounds of age and to advertise jobs which contain an upper age limit and a lower age limit. For example, Dublin Corporation recently advertised for a librarian with the proviso that the applicants be not less than 21 years and not more than 50 years on 1 March 1998. An advertisement for a senior librarian, from the same employer, requires applicants to be not less than 23 years and not more than 50 years on 1 March 1998 while an advertisement for a senior librarian assistant requires candidates to be under 55 years of age. The closing date for these competitions was 9 March.

I understand applicants were told by Dublin Corporation that the inclusion of the age bar in the advertisement was required by instruction from the Department of the Environment and Local Government. I asked the Taoiseach about this matter on the Order of Business last week and he acknowledged the practice of such age discrimination was wrong. Yet it is continuing. The Government is putting legislation through the Oireachtas to end discrimination on grounds of age and at the same time agencies of the State are continuing to discriminate on grounds of age by requiring an upper age limit for jobs they are advertising.

Will the Government issue a directive to all State agencies to immediately discontinue age bars for open competitions? I specifically ask that the Dublin Corporation competition, to which I have referred, and similar current competitions reopened with no age bar as there may be suitably qualified candidates who are deterred from applying.

Age bars may have had some relevance in an era when jobs were for life and pension policy assumed 40 years continuous service in the one job but all that has changed. The world of work is one where increasingly workers will change jobs, employers and even careers a number of times during their life. In those circumstances it is a fundamental denial of a human right to tell somebody they cannot even apply for the job because they are over 50. Every citizen who is suitably qualified for a job should be able to apply for it, irrespective of age. Age discrimination is old fashioned and out of date and should be ended. This practice in which some State agencies are engaging should be brought to an end. It discriminates against people who are over 50, women who want to return to the workplace, people who have lost their jobs in one employment and are debarred from applying for employment in State agencies because they happen to be the wrong age.

I ask the Government, given that it is introducing legislation to end discrimination on age grounds, to issue a directive to all State agencies. In the case of the Dublin Corporation job, I understand it intends to create a panel from this competition which will last for two years. Even when the legislation is enacted, there will still be in existence panels which were based on recruitment practices which, by that time, will be against the law and, as it stands, are manifestly unfair.

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. O'Donoghue)

I thank Deputy Gilmore for raising this very important issue. The Employment Equality Bill, 1997, outlaws discrimination on nine distinct grounds, including age, in relation to access to employment, conditions of employment, equal pay for work of equal value, training, work experience and promotion. I regard the protections which the Bill provides against discrimination on grounds of age, as particularly important to our economic viability as we move into the next millennium. Ireland has a younger demographic profile than many other EU member states. Nonetheless, we, too, are moving towards an increasingly older population supported by a diminishing working age population.

Despite emerging demographic trends, age barriers to employment are EU wide. Some member states with population profiles older than ours have begun to rethink traditional policies that have tended to regard workers over 50, or even younger, as expendable. As a result, there is a growing recognition that older workers often represent highly skilled labour and valuable knowhow. Research by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, among others, supports the view that these workers form a large pool of experienced, reliable and flexible employees. The Employment Equality Bill, 1997, is an important policy intervention geared to change behaviour and attitudes in the workplace so that they are responsive to new demographic and market forces.

Traditionally, age discrimination has been a feature of the labour market. There may have been a sound underlying rationale for this preference in a society where skill lasted a lifetime and recruitment to a big commercial or public service institution offered a "job for life" but structural change in the labour market no longer supports such unthinking discrimination, either on grounds of economics or natural justice.

The pace of change in the world of work is fast and can be expected to gather momentum. The White Paper on Human Resource Development published by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment estimates that in ten years' time, 80 per cent of today's technology will have been replaced but 80 per cent of today's employees will still be in the workforce. The inescapable fact is that workers today are more likely to face redundancy and the task of reintegration into the workforce than would have been the case a generation ago. The interests of natural justice dictate that older workers should not continue to suffer systematic disadvantage in the labour market as a result of the application of outmoded or discriminatory criteria for selection for employment or training.

In applying age anti-discrimination legislation in the labour market, it is essential to have regard to existing labour market practices which facilitate a natural throughput of workers from school leaving age to retirement. The Bill applies to discrimination between employees or prospective employees in the age range 18 to 65 years. There is provision to allow an employer to set a maximum recruitment age for a particular job, providing that maximum age is economically and practically justifiable. In setting such a maximum age, the Bill provides that the employer may take account of the cost and time involved in training a new recruit, to an effective level of work performance, and the need for a reasonable period prior to retirement age during which the recruit will be effective in that job, These exclusions are dictated by the need to ensure that the Bill does not upset economically sensitive recruitment decisions with consequential implications for the operation of the labour market. Any maximum recruitment age set by an employer, in the context of an equality case under the Bill, can be examined by the Director of Equality Investigations to ensure that the age limit set meets the criteria established in the Bill. The focus of this debate is on public service recruitment age limits. Upper recruitment ages for public service appointments are generally quite progressive. Policy in relation to limits for public service recruitment competitions has evolved in this decade in response to the changing work environment and emerging demographic considerations,

Up until the 1980s, the public service, like some private sector organisations today, operated upper age limits for recruitment to most posts which ranged from 20 to 30 or 35 years of age. The Programme for Economic and Social Progress, which was agreed between the social partners in January 1991 gave a commitment to review upper recruitment age limits in the public service. As a result of that review, upper recruitment ages in the public service were raised substantially and, since then, an upper recruitment age limit of 50 has applied in relation to the vast majority of positions in the public service. Depending on the nature of the post and the recruitment needs, upper recruitment age limits of 55 years and even 60 years have applied in specific cases.

The application of upper age limits for open competitions for posts in the Civil Service and other areas of the public service is under review, particularly in light of the provisions of the Employment Equality Bill, 1997, and the fact that, when enacted, the Bill will outlaw discrimination on grounds of age. The Bill will apply to the broad spectrum of jobs in the public service. The variety, number and levels of employment that will be affected are vast, ranging from clerical and administrative workers, through engineers and barristers to Revenue officials and inspectors and field operatives in various Departments and agencies. In the Civil Service, consultations are taking place with a view to bringing recruitment practice fully into line with the requirements of the legislation.

It is likely that an upward shift in maximum recruitment ages for public service appointments will take place after employment equality legislation comes into operation. The shift will not be of great magnitude, however, when regard is had to the present policy of an upper recruitment age of 50 years and the applicable maximum voluntary retirement age of 60 years and maximum compulsory retirement age of 65 years. It is the clear intention, however, that recruitment policy for the Civil Service and other areas of the public service will fully respect the policy enunciated in the Bill.

The issue of discrimination on grounds of age is a major one. That is why I thank the Deputy for raising it. The policy changes that will ensue in the labour market in the area of recruitment and other age linked policies should not be underestimated. In enacting age anti-discrimination legislation, we are setting a lead in Europe. I hope my response to this debate has been useful to the Deputy and others and given an insight into the innovative and far-reaching nature of the legislative proposals contained in the Employment Equality Bill, 1997.

The Dáil adjourned at 9.15 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 11 March 1998.