I commend everyone who has brought forward this motion and all the speakers so far. We have an issue in this country with workers' rights. While I understand the Government may be in denial of that, the fact of the matter is we do not have collective bargaining as a right and that is something which needs to be established as a right. Of course, we enjoy pretty good employment. A lot of employers cannot get workers. That is one of the issues we have across our economy, but we also have an issue where we have a very large number of people who are in precarious employment and do not have the standards that they need to have. Those standards need to be put in place and that will only happen if the State has a firm hand of regulation to ensure they are put in place. That is why it is so important we have trade unions and that more and more workers recognise they would be better off if they were in a trade union. The difficulty is that the employer can just turn their back on that and will not allow trade unions into many workplaces. That is an issue that needs to be dealt with. While Government has this notion that employers, particularly some of the large multinational employers in the country, can somehow or other step outside of the norm, that is not appropriate. We need to have a situation where we guarantee that people who work hard, who get up in the morning very early, who contribute to society and do everything right also have rights, and that those rights are underwritten by the State. That is why the State has to come in to ensure that it underwrites those rights. So far, Government has failed to do that. The big message in this debate this evening is that the Government needs to step up to the mark here and needs to ensure that we guarantee workers the right to collective bargaining and the right to union access in the workplace, and that wages are something that workers must have to be able to live and to be able to get the kind of services they require across the economy. One of the issues that often comes to light - I am sure in the Minister of State's constituency as well - is where we have people who are looking to get home help, for example, but they cannot get workers. We are told that they are advertising and they cannot get anyone. The reality is that such workers are being paid approximately €16 an hour. That is only about €2 above the minimum wage for work which is very difficult and very hard. There is a real, high responsibility in looking after elderly and sick people, yet they are on that kind of salary and that is the salary which is being offered to them by the State. There needs to be recognition that if we are to get people to do those kind of jobs, we need to pay them properly and the first people that have to pay them properly is the State. If the State and the HSE, which are directly employing workers in this regard, pay adequate and proper wages, the other providers will also have to step up to the mark and pay adequate and proper wages. That has failed to happen. I commend this motion to the House and I hope that Government sits up and listens.

Sentiment score: 0.11