Mattie McGrath: Welcomes Bill but Warns Red Tape Hurts Small Employers

I welcome this piece of legislation here today, the Director of Workers and Employers Insolvency and Protection of Workers Bill. Deputy Gould and the lecturer have given people here. First of all, I want to declare that I am part of a company that we employ up to 25 people. I am sure you are well aware that you have self-employed yourself for years, and there are many people out, small business people, who are doing their very best to keep the doors open. This piece of legislation is welcome, but speaking from an employer's point of view, you certainly now would need, with the amount of legislation, and while I welcome this piece of it, but the amount of legislation and changes and directives and EU directives that have come in in the last, you know, 20 years. When I started the business, it was 41 years actually, 1980, 82, 3. It was simple enough at that time, and we did our books and we did our account and everything else. It has to be right, I am not saying I want shortcuts, I do not, but now for every five employees that you have, you would need a secretary to deal with all the paperwork, with all the reams of legislation, and you could not possibly understand it without having a quasi-legal, you know, some kind of a draft of legislation, but you could not keep up with it, and it is very onerous, and that is turning off a lot of people from being self-employed and self-employed people walking away from it. I see people and they have left and they have gone to Canada and they have gone to Australia, and the cost of living over there is high as well, and the cost of houses, but they can run a business and have employees and abide by the legislation, but they are unable to make a profit and come back home here and try and set up a business. We want to encourage that as well, but the bureaucracy here is crazy, and as I said, what happened with the Debenhams workers, and in some of the bigger co-ops now, the Stafford Outers, you know, in my case, South Tipperary farmers, small co-ops, and then I went on to Avonmoor, then I went on to Lanbea, and there was Tierlearn, I'm sure you'll be well aware of Count Cole, and you really as well. A huge company now, and then you have the Kerry Group, and you have a couple more of them, and I was forever praising the likes of Mon Nahon Co-op, and the Tipperary Co-op in Tipperary and Arribon, but Tipperary Co-op has run into difficulties recently, and they've had to have amalgamation, and their workers are being displaced due to that amalgamation, and I have to salute the board members of the co-op through the decades, they held the reins tightly, but they got in these whiskies, and they went mad with borrowing, and they got themselves into huge trouble, and this is the end of it, they've lost their identity now, Tipperary Co-op is no longer, and 30 to 40 employees in a town, an area where they're ravished by unemployment, and by lack of investment. So, I mean, you have these, and Deputy Nolan referred to a number of reports by PwC and by the others, and no matter what goes on in this, for this government, the only answer they seem to have is to get PwC, or to get some of the other big finance houses, and there are only a couple of them, the tentacles and everything, and we had them as well, they gave a clear bill of health to the banks back, I remember, in 2007 and 2008, before the crash. So, there's a kind of a cosy circle, and a cosy arrangement here, where, you know, these people are waiting all the time to give you whatever advice you want to get, they'll give it and provide it, and there are many good employees working in all those companies as well, and young people, young graduates, but as I said, they are, they have questions to answer as well about the crash here, and about the continuing crash, and the continuing situation in our country. So, employees must be protected, and you would know, Count Crona, and anyone interested in self-implied and implying people. It's a two-way street. If you treat your employees with dignity and respect, and with good manners, you will have positive employee relationships, and if you pay the proper PSI for them, and pay the proper insurance schemes, and whatever else, and health and safety, and all the other pieces of legislation have to be looked at. But then you have big companies, and they have the bogus self-implied, and I met a, I met a legion of RTE officials going out, I'd say about 10 or 12 of them, and they were shaking hands, I mean, said they missed me from the committees today, but I'm not on that committee anymore, but anyway, you know, the amount of bogus employees that are on RTE, and with the knowledge of ministers, for over two decades now, decade and a half, and of the Department of Finance and the Department of Employment, strange happenings are going on out there, and still going on out there, and court cases and settlements have been made, and who pays for the settlements? The taxpayers, who are funding RTE. So, I mean, the R100 punter, as Deputy Noam was talking about, the small business, to keep the door of Suskill, it's in Shopa, it's in Tigo's town, in the restaurants, everywhere else, they must be supported, and it's vital that they are supported. And one way of supporting them would be, to give them a level playing field, to give them space, and give them a bit of room, and a bit of, as I said, encouragement. And you have, like, Neera, going around the National Employers' Rights Association. I've said this year countless times in this house, their name should be changed to a support organisation for employers. They don't walk in flashing the car at a minute past midnight, that you must have a different way of structure per hour for employees flashing their cars, as has happened to businesses in my county and every other county. They should be walking in during the day, tell me to meet the manager or the owner here, or the management team, how can we help you? Because it's tough times out there in business. And I see now that the last Concola has taken over, and he understands this intimately, a self-implied businessman as well, it's tough times out there. And you have legions of officials, legions of them, columns of them coming along, and different, with different identification, the flashing badges at you, when you might be at your lowest, when you might be missing employees through sickness or something else, and you might be struggling to keep, you know, might have a funeral coming into a hotel or something else has happened. And they're there, on their travelling expenses, driving around the country, near an hour and get five different offices in the regions around the country. As I said, these people need to be reined in, and need to be asked to listen to to help the businesses. I'm not saying that anyone should be breaking the laws, no, I'm not at this area either, but they should be there to help, and support these businesses, not all the time, the big stick, and fasten the card, and then you go and say it worth them, then make a complaint, and then you're in another situation. I would have turned to Sinn Féin then, and Deputy Gould, with the position of the chair, you know, he wasn't here, but he was lecturing people for not being here today. I mean, I don't see many Sinn Féin people here either. He doesn't understand, and the Count Coulard had to point out to them that there are committees taking place. There are lots of other side meetings going on. So Sinn Féin have the answer to everything, but can do nothing. And there were MIAs in the last five years of government missing in action, went to Hyde. They paid the price for that in the election. But their behaviour here, which, you know, and what they joined in with the other groups, left and left and left and more left. And the so-called know everything about the independent Ireland. God is the one of them to see her air flag flying over as well. And they tried to deny our speaking rights. They put in old and I that her, she can speak for herself, are independents, and we're not in any group, but they wanted them useless, because they didn't like what we say, because we tell the truth. You'd be used to be independent, independent. The problem with these lads and ladies is they're not fit for government. Full stop, they've proven that in the north. And they haven't shaken off the legacy of the bullying and intimidation and the kneecaps and everything else yet. We saw what happened here last night in the Chamber, when they had a gallery full of people here, to organise Arrakis with flags and banners. And I said to the head usher today, East Sinn Féin TD, they signed those people in, that they misbehaved last night, should have been, should be restricted from having businesses here again, if they can't obey the rules of the House. Justine with the legislation, Deputy. Sorry? Justine with the legislation. I am, but I'm addressing Deputy, I'm addressing Deputy Gould. And if I could address the so-called freedom fighters of independent Ireland, a deputy brought in, an outside person to this house, with a tripod and a camera, and he made appalling videos. And then it had the good staff, the excellent staff of this house inside the restaurant, and the excellent cuisine as well, and a good director of all of us. No, this is important to put it on the record. It is, yeah, but I want to call a deputy, a friend to withdraw and apologise, because he doesn't know anything about business. This is the business, the restaurant, and a lot of people employed there, and the bear, and the house, and the ushers. And to denigrate this house, and his workers, and his staff, and his cuisine. Deputy McGrath, I accept all of that, but this is not the place for our conversation. This is about legislation. This is the problem here with this house. Stick to the legislation. Yes, I'm doing my best to sit today, and I understand the legislation, and I am an employer, but it's not for a political party here to me. The answer to everything, cause raucousness, and disturbances like that, there should be some issue that way they have to pay the price. Otherwise we'll have bedroom in this house. If I bring in a visitor, I'm responsible for anyone else, but in vain they have to have their own love. So they decided after the election, when they lost it, to Sult, and obstruct this house, and do any business here for months. Nothing was done. As you know, or yourself, Laskan Crola, and in the interest of so-called, I don't know what. So back to the legislation, yes, it's needed. But we must also have some kind of an impact analysis, which we seldom have here on any legislation. Where legislation is bedding in, give it a year, every piece of legislation should have a kind of recall, a reassessment, but very little of it has here. We implement a piece of legislation, and it's left there on the books. So whether it's good or bad or different, it's left on companies and small businesses are trying to, especially are trying to trade and continue trading underneath that legislation, without any kind of an impact analysis of the possible downsides to this legislation. Because, in fairness to the drafters of the legislation, they're not going to be able to see all the different impacts that it may have or might have. So there should be some kind of a system where you can go back and amend it, or assess it at least, with a view to amending it, after, after, after, after, you know, after 12 months. And it's there with a Bill in the Shannon, which is a very reasonable bill by Malcolm Noonan, and a bill to, to, to, to kind of do something with the vacant properties, and many shops and small businesses that are supposed to close, and a York County Well Minister and Mayo, and to allow them to be, that you could meet with a pre-planer if you have somebody who wants to invest in that property to do it up with a living accommodation, hopefully as a small shop with it as well, or a mixture of both, that'll have to be gear cut. That's not waiting three and four years, and you're not getting every obstacle in the book. And that's good legislation I brought in by Deputy Senator Noonan. And the government have put an amendment that it laid for a year. Why in a housing crisis? They've estimated that there's probably 10,000 of these properties, and that's probably conservative properties in Ireland. In the midst of a fierce housing crisis that we're supposed to be throwing the book at, and we're supposed to have all hands on deck, and this is a piece of legislation going to be delayed by the government for 12 months. Why? Oh, why, oh, why? I mean, we need those supports. The small businesses need the supports, and the employees need this. And remember, I'm not anti-employee, I wouldn't have a business without my employees. I want to pay tribute to them. And most businesses are the same, as I said, the big, the good relationship with small businesses. But it's the big, big businesses. And it could be an equine in the air, and they're in the big co-ops now, the big names, with the board meetings on board yachts at sea, not yachts, but cruise liners. And when they've lost touch with the ordinary people, and they often have bogus employees, they often have ways around, and they have powerful ways of dealing with any issues that have been arise to them. So, that's John Cora, Tommy Creek, but as I said, it's God's been to sit here and listen to a lecture from Deputy Gould, and Sinn Féin, who, none of them must have ever applied anywhere in their life. They're going to threaten them, all right, and bullying them. Thank you.