Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 19 June 2018
37. Deputy Willie Penrose asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the number of calls received to the helpline established as part of the public awareness campaign on false self-employment; the number of emails received; the number of staff allocated to the campaign; and the number of new investigations opened by SCOPE since the launch as a result of communications received. [26541/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraIn recent years, bogus self-employment has become a curse or blight across the economy. We are all aware that false self-employment is prevalent and it has become rampant in certain sectors. We are also aware that self-employment is an important form of employment, which makes a significant contribution to the economy. I have been self-employed for the past 37 years. I have no doubt that the genuinely self-employed do not want people who are genuinely employed and should be classified as PAYE workers interspersed among their number. This practice deprives the Exchequer of the pot to which it is entitled for disbursement to ordinary workers.
The media campaign on false self-employment was aimed at ensuring there would be better public awareness of the important service the Department provided in determining employment status and helping to develop a better understanding of the scale and nature of false self-employment. The main advertising campaign was run over a two-week period, with digital and social media promotions continuing for a further two weeks. As a first step, the campaign directed people to a dedicated page on my Department's website. The website provides important information on the impact of false self-employment and the criteria used to determine whether someone is an employee or self-employed, as well as contact information for the Scope section within my Department, the Workplace Relations Commission and the Revenue Commissioners. The new web page attracted more than 10,500 visits during the campaign, with an average time of more than three minutes spent on the page, which is regarded as very favourable, given people's reduced attention span these days.
The Scope section received approximately 50 calls and 30 emails during the campaign from individuals who had become aware of the service directly as a result of the ad campaign. Feedback suggests the detailed information available on the dedicated website appears to have been successful in addressing issues for many people who contacted us. The majority of callers confirmed that they had visited the website first before contacting the Department. Ten formal applications for a Scope decision were registered in the first week.
Staff in the Scope section, the communications unit and the social welfare inspectorate were involved in the campaign as part of their regular duties. An additional executive officer, EO, has been allocated to the Scope section on a permanent basis. The Scope section has six EOs who are deciding officers. Social welfare inspectors are undertaking targeted employer inspections based on the feedback gathered during the campaign. They will focus on the sectors identified and companies reported to the Scope section during that time. While the number of direct contacts with the Scope section has been small, I am satisfied that the campaign has been successful in raising public awareness of the issue of false self-employment, but as the Deputy and I both know, we have a long way to go.
There is a set of winners and only one loser. The winners are the people who engage in bogus self-employment. Employers save on PRSI and taxation and are dodging the employment laws applicable to normal PAYE workers and the Social Insurance Fund receives less, as does everyone involved. Workers who are categorised falsely lose out on rights set out in employment legislation such as pay, including holiday pay, and redundancy payments - the whole shebang. I am not surprised the Minister did not receive an awful lot, as I do not think it was the right way to go about it. I know that she is into innovation and fair play to her, but my colleague, Mr. Jack O'Connor, dismissed the initiative on the basis that it was about as useful as an ashtray on a motor bike. In effect, an ashtray on a motor bike would mean one would get nothing. How could people take up the initiative? It is no wonder the number was small. There is a genuine fear. People do not become involved lightly. From talking to the Minister, I appreciate that that is what she wants and that she is committed to making various changes. I know that in her heart she wants the initiative to be a success, but if it is not as successful as she wants it to be, is she prepared to consider the legislative route?
New and legitimate forms of work have emerged and will continue to emerge. It is not just happening in Ireland. In fact, Ireland is probably lagging behind the rest of the world in the uptake of new forms of work, which is not bad. We constantly talk about bogus self-employment and attribute it to a particular industry, as if it were bad. People being made self-employed when they do not want to be and should not be is definitely not good, but the emergence of new ways of working is not bad. What I want to be sure about is that all of the standard employment rights for people with normal jobs are available to those who work in the gig or platform economy, as well as all of the benefits of which employees are able to avail under the social insurance system. We are improving all of them in another piece of legislation that will go through the House next week. I want to make sure the two situations stand equal with each other and will not stop as long as I am in this position. However, that does not directly answer the Deputy's question. I will continue to pursue research that may end up as legislation to address the large number who do it voluntarily or those who are made to do it, namely, those who declare to be self-employed in order to work on a contract basis with a company. These companies are not paying into the Social Insurance Fund for the people concerned and that is wrong. That is something we should pursue and it will have to be pursued with legislation. As the Deputy is well aware, it does not just come within the remit of my Department, but for as long as I am in this role it is something I will pursue.
I acknowledge that the Minister wants to root out this practice and deal with the primary motivation of rogue employers. A genuine employer does not want to misrepresent the status of his or her workers to avoid paying tax or PRSI, but fraud is fraud no matter where it occurs. If an ordinary worker fails to do something, the entire panoply of the State comes down on top of him or her over a few pence and he or she is named, blamed and shamed. The Labour Party introduced the Protection of Employment (Measures to Counter False Self Employment) Bill 2017 which took an holistic approach to determine and classify employment status. A clear set of rules was to be set out in statute law to apply to all State bodies and enforced across the board by the courts and administrative tribunals. It sought to amend tax law and measures on avoidance to deal with bogus self-employment and apply PRSI. If such a measure was in place, it would be a major deterrent. There would be no fear that anybody would want to classify one way or the other. Employers who might consider forcing a person to go down the route of false self-employment would think twice and probably five times before he or she would do so. I know that is what the Minister wants. Perhaps we might not need to go to these lengths and the Minister's campaign will succeed. I wish the initiative well because it is something on which the Labour Party has been very focused, together with the trade unions, and we will remain so until the issue is finally resolved and everybody is classified appropriately to their employment status.
I heard Mr. Jack O'Connor on radio on the day we launched the campaign and he was in flying form. If he was being paid by the word per minute, he would be a wealthy man. I wish him every success in County Wicklow when he runs in the next general election. I know that he will do well.
He will be with Deputy John Brady.
I hear what the Deputy is saying and while I do not wish to be disrespectful to him, it goes so far as to address the issue of those who are being forced to declare as self-employed, but many choose to be self-employed for a variety of reasons, including the flexibility offered by working for one company one month and another for three months or receiving a higher premium for working on a contract. These companies are not paying into the Social Insurance Fund and not doing anything wrong, but we are still not getting money from them for the State to pay benefits to the people who are self-employed to whom, as the Deputy is aware, they are being extended under the social insurance scheme. There are a number of things we could do and we should look at them collectively. One particular piece of legislation is only going to crack one nut. This is a bigger issue. However, we must be cognisant of the fact that there are new forms of work and that we need to encourage people into them as an entry level for young people in order that they can do so while in college and then move to proper careers once they qualify. However, we also need to make sure they retain the same employment rights as everyone else in a standard working environment.
