Brian Stanley urges legal protection for trade union recognition
Brian Stanley thanked Deputy Murphy and Deputy Coppinger and spoke in support of their bill to strengthen workers' rights to trade union recognition. He said the State is well behind other EU states, criticised employers' refusal to recognise unions and urged the minister and TDs to close legal loopholes and deliver collective bargaining.
He described the bill as timely, thanked the deputies for bringing it forward and framed the measure as necessary to modernise industrial relations in the State.
He argued that, while the constitution guarantees the right to join a trade union, employers do not have to recognise unions - meaning staff can be denied collective bargaining and the protections that union membership offers.
He warned that private sector unionisation is very low, employment in many sectors has become casualised with no set hours, short-term contracts and employment agencies are common, and workers' rights in many cases have gone backwards.
He said hard-won basic rights have been undermined by union-busts and victimisation, that groups of workers are pitted against each other, and that unionised workers are sometimes cleared out and replaced by lower-paid, non-union staff - citing occurrences in the beef industry and some beef plants.
He criticised hollow verbal support from previous ministers unless acted on, urged the minister not to backpedal but to "put your foot on the accelerator," and appealed to all TDs to support the bill to close the loophole in Irish law and bring collective bargaining into the 21st century.
Bill and opening remarks
He described the bill as timely, thanked the deputies for bringing it forward and framed the measure as necessary to modernise industrial relations in the State.
Legal gap on union recognition
He argued that, while the constitution guarantees the right to join a trade union, employers do not have to recognise unions - meaning staff can be denied collective bargaining and the protections that union membership offers.
Workplace trends and impacts
He warned that private sector unionisation is very low, employment in many sectors has become casualised with no set hours, short-term contracts and employment agencies are common, and workers' rights in many cases have gone backwards.
Union-busting and sector examples
He said hard-won basic rights have been undermined by union-busts and victimisation, that groups of workers are pitted against each other, and that unionised workers are sometimes cleared out and replaced by lower-paid, non-union staff - citing occurrences in the beef industry and some beef plants.
Appeal to the minister and TDs
He criticised hollow verbal support from previous ministers unless acted on, urged the minister not to backpedal but to "put your foot on the accelerator," and appealed to all TDs to support the bill to close the loophole in Irish law and bring collective bargaining into the 21st century.
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Transcript
I want to thank Deputy Murphy and Deputy Coppinger for bringing forward this important bill, and very timely. Minister, as a state, we are well behind other EU states in terms of the rights of workers to be represented by a trade union. In most other EU states that is a legal guarantee, so we are completely out of line with most of the rest of our European neighbours. That right has been resisted by successive governments and big business down through the decades. While the constitution guarantees the right to be able to join a trade union, an employer does not have to recognise it, and can simply refuse the right of staff to collect the bargaining and the protection that union membership offers. When we take that employers have greater social and economic powers than workers, that is just a simple fact. The only power that a worker has is through combining with their co-workers, so as they can't be picked off individually, as a tactic that is often used, and I have witnessed in myself in workplaces, hundreds of thousands of low-paid workers have no representation and very little rights. And if we take the percentage of workers in the private sector that are now unionised, it is very, very low at the moment, and that needs to change. The employment in many sectors has become casualised with no set hours. Short-term contracts are common, as is so-called employment agencies. Workers' rights in a lot of cases have gone backwards, and that needs to change. Hard-woned basic rights have been undermined by union busts and activities. Workers who join a trade union are sometimes targeted by their employer and victimised, and there are good examples of that around the state. One group of workers will be pled off against another, which is common practice, and in some cases unionised workers will be cleared out of the business and replaced in a relatively short period of time with lower-paid, non-unionised workers. That can be seen around this country, where that is happening. The beef industry and some beef plants have happened. When previous government ministers have stated that they fully support the right of any worker to join a trade union and be active in their trade union, they are hollow words. It does not have any meaning, because you cannot bring it into effect, and workers will tell you that. If you talk to workers about joining a union, they will express a fear in a lot of cases of being targeted by their imposts over being a union member. Could I ask you this? Could you imagine the uproar if members of IBEC were told by government, or the Hotel Federation, or the IFA, or other organisations, which legitimately have a right to collectively negotiate with government? Could you imagine if they were told by government that they can't represent their members? They should only deal with one or two of them individually. There will be an uproar in this country. So it is time to close the loophole in Irish law. It is time to bring industrial relations into the 21st century. It is time to catch up with our EU neighbours. I heard your words that the Government have committed to bringing in collective bargain. I would ask you not to backpedal on this. Put your foot on the accelerator and drive this on. We need to move into the 21st century with industrial relations in this country. I appeal to all TDs to support this good bill. Thank you.