Proposal for agency to police rogue employers

ROGUE employers who fail to comply with employment rights legislation will be liable to jail terms of up to three years and maximum fines of €250,000 under a new bill being proposed by the Government.

Enterprise, Trade and Employment Minister Micheál Martin said yesterday that the Employment Rights Compliance Bill would overhaul the state’s framework for the policing of workers’ entitlements.

Mr Martin also confirmed a separate scheme that will require 35,000 foreign students to obtain work permits in order to take up part-time jobs.

The measure is designed to tackle what are believed to be abuses of existing student visas by foreigners in order to circumvent strict rules on immigration visas for workers from outside the EU and European Economic Area.

The bill, expected to be enacted by the summer, is a key element in the Government’s programme for greater worker protection negotiated under Towards 2016 partnership talks.

“This bill will modernise the labour inspectorate, strengthen enforcement of employment rights and work permits, promote greater compliance in the workplace and increase the penalties for those employers who seek to gain advantage by denying employees their entitlements under law,” said Mr Martin.

The legislation will place the new National Employment Rights Agency on a statutory basis and give labour inspectors increased powers to access workplace and employment records.

It will also enable it to conduct joint investigations with other state agencies including An Garda Síochána, Revenue and social welfare inspectors.

Employers will be obliged to maintain a comprehensive lists of documents relating to the most recent three-year employment period, which must be retained for a further two years.

The agency will be able to issue fixed payment fines of €500-€1,000 for minor offences such as the failure to display information notices on employment rights in the workplace.

Mr Martin stressed that the vast majority of employers were compliant with existing legislation and had nothing to fear.

SIPTU, the country’s largest trade union, gave a guarded welcome to the bill last night. However, it warned that it would not enter talks on a new national wage agreement unless this commitment in Towards 2016 was delivered.

Union general president, Jack O’Connor, acknowledged that the legislation appeared to significantly enhance protection afforded to vulnerable workers.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions also broadly welcomed the bill but expressed concern that it did not oblige employers to keep employment records within the state.

An ICTU spokesperson said this created a risk that employers would open foreign offices where they could base records to conceal any irregularities.

Fine Gael spokesman Leo Varadkar welcomed the publication of the bill but called amendments to allow the agency to impose fines without going to court.

He expressed concern that none of 192 employers who were identified as paying staff below the minimum wage last year had faced a criminal prosecution.