George Lawlor: Ireland's Minimum Wage Law and Collective Bargaining Gap

I very much welcome the discussions here this morning and I would like to focus on the transposition and implementation of the Adequate Minimum Wage Directive in Ireland. Ireland is committed to the full implementation of the directive and transposed it into national law by the transposition deadline back in 2024. By way of background, Ireland introduced a statutory national minimum wage in 2000. The Low Pay Commission was then established by statute in 2015 and is made up of equal members of employee and employer representatives and independent experts. The Commission makes annual recommendations on the appropriate rate of minimum wage after considering a number of statutory criteria. Minimal changes were required to Ireland's wage setting framework to bring it into line with the directive. Perhaps one of the most important changes was introducing the statutory criteria for the Commission to consider the adequacy of minimum wages with reference to the 60% median wage benchmark as required by Article 5 of the Directive. But as has been seen from Mr Shulton's slides, in terms of median wage and average wage, we still languish towards the bottom of those leagues and this is something we certainly need to work upon. We also have the difficulty of young people who are excluded from the full protection of minimum wage, with people under 18 being paid just 70% of the minimum. Low legislation was needed in Ireland to transpose the collective bargaining elements of the Directive. Although proceedings were before the Court of Justice of the European Union on the Directive, Ireland remained committed to progressing and delivering a national action plan to promote collective bargaining ahead of the Court's decision and we fulfilled that commitment in November 2025. Ireland's action plan to promote collective bargaining was launched in November 2025. This is an area that Ireland must do much more on if we are to catch up with our European colleagues in strengthening the industrial relations framework and enhancing the quality of working life across the country. The EU average for collective bargaining, as we have been told, is roughly 75-80%, while Ireland once again languishes near the bottom of this list, between 34 and 40%. We simply must do better. The collective bargaining plan was developed by the Ministry of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment in close consultation with the social partners, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and the Irish Business and Employers Confederation. Ireland's action plan is firmly grounded in the requirements of the Directive and provides a structured programme of measures to promote collective bargaining across the state. This simply cannot be a talking shop and it simply has to succeed in improving the collective bargaining coverage across the state. The action plan sets out 22 targeted actions across five pillars. Understanding the impacts of collective bargaining through enhanced research and data collection. Empowering and encouraging participation via capacity building programmes and recognition initiatives. Promoting awareness and best practices without legislative overreach. Protecting the rights of workers and trade union representatives through legal reviews and safeguards. Supporting the Workplace Relations Commission and Labour Court with digital innovation and institutional strengthening. The implementation process is underway and is being overseen by a technical group consisting of the social partners as well as government officials. It is important to highlight that Ireland has models of bipartite and tripartite dialogue through various forums such as the Labour Employer Economic Forum, known as LEAF. Under the auspices of LEAF, social partners have been involved in the design and implementation of key employment and social policies. In recent months, Ireland has also seen the establishment of thematic subgroups under LEAF on targeted key issues such as transposition of EU directives, collective bargaining and migration. Alongside existing collective bargaining mechanisms, Joint Labour Committees or JLCs are statutory bodies that bring together employer and worker representatives in specific sectors in Ireland where collective bargaining coverage is low. Their role is to negotiate minimum pay and conditions for workers in that sector. Once agreed, these terms are formalised in an employment regulation order, which is legally binding for all employers and employees in that sector. However, currently there are only three active EROs for workers in contract cleaning, early years learning and security sectors. Resistance has been met to the Joint Labour Committees in some sectors. For instance, the hotel industry refused to attend these committees and therefore ridiculously have a veto over the entire process, which is ludicrous. I welcome today's discussions and I do hope that my words can contribute in some way to the debate here this morning. Thank you very much.