Sinn F\u00e9in Dublin South West representative, Se\u00e1n Crowe TD,\u00a0 has said he is extremely disappointed in the complete lack of\u00a0 vision and the scope of the proposals being circulated around the legislative role and responsibilities of the Low Pay Commission, which he said \u201clacked teeth\u201d.<\/p>\n
Crowe is critical of the approach taken by the Minister of State for Business and Employment, Ged Nash, and claims that his current proposals limit the work of a Low Pay Commission to the short term consideration of the national minimum wage, and that this creates a degree of uncertainty for workers and legitimate employers.<\/p>\n
Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe said:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe draft legislation being proposed for the Low Pay Commission by Minister of State for Business and Employment, Ged Nash, is disappointing. It lacks teeth, vision, and will create even more uncertainty for vulnerable workers and continue to disadvantage legitimate employers.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor some bizarre reasoning Minister Nash is proposing to replicate the current British Commission, which increasingly is being found to be totally inadequate and not fit for purpose.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Britain under the Conservative led Government, casual low paid insecure work has become the norm and this is increasingly being copied by unscrupulous employers in Ireland.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn a race to the bottom, zero hour contracts, poor working conditions, and low pay are causing extreme hardship for workers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis type of work practices also undermines and puts at a huge disadvantage many legitimate and fair employers.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo if there is an acceptance that sharp practices are becoming more and more entrenched and supposedly the norm in Ireland, then why is the draft legislation governing the work of a Low Pay Commissions doing nothing to tackle or somehow reverse this growing trend<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Crowe continued:<\/p>\n
\u201cWith this backdrop it is bizarre and inconceivable that any Minister, but particularly a Labour one, would narrow the scope and work of a Low Pay Commission.<\/p>\n
\u201cEssentially limiting it to consider only short term increases in the national minimum wage, that will be paid to small percentage, about 5 per cent, of all Irish workers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is also no reference in Minister Nash\u2019s proposals to inequality, poverty, gender, migrant workers, public services access or social protections in this proposed legislation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we are to learn from other more inclusive jurisdictions, then the proposed Low Pay Commission\u2019s terms of reference need to be extended. It needs to be established as the primary watchdog on low pay and its responsibilities widened to tackle the extent of low pay, not just the minimum wage. This would enable it to make long term sector specific recommendations to the government of the day.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sinn F\u00e9in Dublin South West representative, Se\u00e1n Crowe TD,\u00a0 has said he is extremely disappointed in the complete lack of\u00a0 vision and the scope of the proposals being circulated around the legislative role and responsibilities of the Low Pay Commission, which he said \u201clacked teeth\u201d. Crowe is critical of the approach taken by the Minister […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,59,163,164,144],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-decent-work","category-employment","category-jobs","category-pay","category-workers-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2111"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2111\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2112,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2111\/revisions\/2112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}