Kathleen Funchion on Work‑Life Balance Bill and Remote Working

So I think some of the mistakes that we make in here in this chamber is sometimes we take far too long with legislation and then other times we rush legislation and I think that there is some really really good positives in the work-life balance bill and it's welcome and there's lots of groups as I had referenced before like the Cares Association and other groups that are really happy to see this come forward but this particular section kind of being inserted into it I think is nearly unfair to the bill for want of better words but also as a lot of the queries and the questions that Deputy O'Reilly has raised we should have the normal time to tease them out through like pre-ledge and committee stage and all the other stages so I think it does need to be a separate piece of legislation obviously that's not what's going to happen now but I just want to make the point that I do see where she's coming from in relation to this and how we should have the opportunity to interrogate this separately because it nearly takes away from all of the really good things and all the really long overdue things that are in the work-life balance bill around you know leave for parents of sick children and everything else like that that many people will be waiting for a very long time and I think there is a lot of really very genuine questions there in relation to that and I don't know will we be able to kind of get the sufficient answers to them this evening or is there is this part of it going to be reviewed is it being reviewed separately or I know there was a mention earlier of a two years review will that be built into it and if there's any comments on that thanks and thanks to the deputies for their contributions I think you know deputies have spoken about the the process both in terms of the work we've done uh through committee on the original work-life balance directive and of course the the work that's been done on the uh right to remote working bill and I'm aware that a very detailed pls process was undertaken and the detailed pls report was was published I think just in terms of the amendments being brought forward today we are implementing the recommendations of the pls report and I don't I actually struggle to think how often I've seen such a clear implementation of a pls report in legislation so I'll cite recommendation five the committee recommends that code of good practice are quickly evolved so that once in place refusals must be grounded in the stated policy from employers founded on these codes the committee proposes the principle sorry number six the committee proposes the principles underlying underpinning a reasonable code of practice should now be set out in law and allow the wrc to design how they should be applied in different workplace situations we're doing both of those with this legislation the committee advises that to accompany the primary legislation above with a wrc and we're using the wrc code of practice to elaborate on and encourage uh reasonableness on the part of employer and employee we're doing that number eight the committee proposes legislation should mandate the wrc to draw up a code of practice in the first instance upon which the policies of employers can be based we're doing that and finally the committee proposes that the legislation should align with the general scheme of a work-life balance and miscellaneous provisions bill we're doing that we are implementing the recommendations brought forward from the pls on remote working and implementing it again in a way that you know you know what we've had discussions deputy function in terms of how much of a pls has gone into a piece of legislation I really think a lot of this pls has gone into that this piece of legislation so I think it's just maybe worth worth setting that out at the start there will be a two-year review of this legislation and I think that's important we're doing a number of new and innovative things here and this is an area of inner the area of of remote working particularly is an innovative one as um deputy o'reilly said some companies now offer it from day one and that's a positive thing but again we're putting in place a statutory right to request it here so there will be a review after two years and as we know that review will also look at potentially um expanding the um right of the the the rights of flexible working uh which is right for for um for for varied hours or shorter working day which currently as implementing the eu directive only applies to parents and carers that will examine expanding that further as well which could be a potential further advancement of of the rights of of workers generally and of course it will look at the provisions of the uh five uh five days look at the uptake of uh dsgbv leave and see what changes need to be made there so just wants to make those as as a general point in terms of the uh in in in terms of the six months the six months uh within which uh the the right to request gets its statutory basis that allows an assessment in terms of the uh needs of the work of the employer and the needs of the employee it may not be automatically uh available in every workplace from day one for a full understanding of can uh write to a can a request for remote working meet the needs of both the employer and the employee it's also important to remember that the uh right can be granted after six months but that doesn't stop an employee uh applying for it earlier as we know there's a a number of weeks of a of an application uh process in which their application is judged that can happen before the six month period of time but the actual ability to take up the right kicks in after the uh after the six month uh period of uh of of time and again as i said remote working is about balancing the employer's rights and the the rights of the the the employee and i think maybe on that point it is worth maybe drawing a comparison and deputy o'reilly referred to the to the uk uh legislation where where she where she argues part of the approach adopted there is is better than the approach being adopted here i think it's worth um uh just just looking contrasting the uk proposals with our own our own proposals contain no statutory grounds for refusal that was in the original piece of uh proposal on remote working that the 13 reasons why and now we have no statutory grounds for refusal unlike in the uk legislation where they've eight statutory grounds of refusal um the um irish legislation campaign contains an explicit legal obligation for employers to consider the employee's needs that's part of the balancing test under the irish law that's not the case in the ue the uk legislation and also the irish law contains no limits to the number of requests that can be made under the uk legislation that's limited to one request for per year so i think in terms of the overall strength of our legislation it it stacks up well uh vis-a-vis what's being uh what's being proposed in the uh united kingdom in terms then of some of the uh other specific uh specific points that were made the definitions that a deputy o'reilly spoke about so the uh reasonable adverse so the substantial adverse effect and the reasonable grounds both of those will be fleshed out within that code of conduct that we've discussed earlier on that will be brought forward by the workplace uh relations uh commission in terms of the the ask of the of the location look you know some remote working requests will probably be uh granted in terms of also having reasonable access to the office uh if if the the the employer the employee is needed to to attend in the office or intended in the workplace at some point i think in that conjunct context it's reasonable for the uh employer to understand where the uh where the employee is uh is based and will be proposing to undertake the um the the uh the work uh in terms then just of the uh exclusions and again i suppose this uh has to be understood in terms of what this is this is a right to request or not it's it's not a statutory right to remote working we we recognize that it is a right to to request um and um as we know not all occupations not all industries or particular roles within an enterprise will be suitable or appropriate for remote uh remote working and as such there has to be some element of an exclusion provision in there but again that is something that can be looked at in that two-year review that uh that we spoke about here you're wrong