Paul Murphy accuses ministers of secret meetings, defends youth pay

It is a shame that the Minister is not here. I hope that he is listening. I do not know if he is doing the sum up or you are doing the sum up reply at the end. I have some questions for him. This morning I asked what interactions he had, Minister Burke, with Michael O'Leary who launched his election campaign since taking office. The interesting thing is that I have just received the written answer. The written answer says he has had no official interaction with him, which raises some eyebrows. I listened back to the tape of our engagement earlier and he said he had no interaction with him in connection with any of his work. I have to say it leaves a big question for me. Does it mean that he has met him unofficially and that he is covering it up? We know that Fine Gael and this government have form on this. Michael O'Leary had a secret private dinner with Pascal Donoghue when he was Minister for Finance in February 2022. It was not disclosed under lobbying laws and it was not listed in the Minister's diary. Apparently Fine Gael ministers and Michael O'Leary just enjoy each other's companies. The reason this is relevant is because Michael O'Leary was lauding Peter Burke as the man who had to be in to, quote, get shit done on behalf of enterprise. It is a pro-Michael O'Leary, pro-big business agenda that this government has been pushing, accelerated in the last number of weeks at the expense of workers. I also asked the Minister this morning and I asked the Taoiseach later on about the government's scandalous decision to abandon abolishing sub-minimum wages for young workers despite the clear recommendation of the low-pay commission that they be abolished. The Minister's excuse earlier was that if young workers were not paid less than the minimum wage they might leave school early. It is apparently out of concern for their future prospects that caring bosses pay young workers as little as £9.45 an hour for doing the exact same work as anybody else. If they got £13.50 an hour apparently they would drop out of school. That was an excuse that was examined by the low-pay commission and dismissed. Another excuse that we heard from ISME at the Oireachtas hearings last year was that, quote, to give a 16-year-old an adult wage without clear guidance and support, which is not an employer's job, creates poor money habits. They usually lack bills and expenses and may favour gratification before learning how to budget, save and create sustainable spending habits. So if they got £13.50 an hour they would blow it all on gratification, heaven forbid. Bosses are now concerned about young workers' moral development as well. The third excuse was that employers wouldn't employ as many young people if they had to pay them the full minimum wage and I'm not making this up that that would be bad for youth mental health. So we have early school leaving, self-gratification and mental health all put forward as excuses for keeping sub-minimum wages. Of course there is zero evidence of any of this. These excuses are, to put it plainly, complete nonsense. They are all excuses that the low-pay commission examined themselves. The low-pay commission commissioned the SRI to do a report and went through each of these excuses and knocked them down and said no there is no basis of this. Based on international evidence, for example in the UK where you used to have a lower rate of minimum wage for those under 25, that was abolished and it had zero impact in terms of these measures. The reason, it gets to the point, the reason that the government and employers are tying themselves up in knots to come up with ridiculous excuses for keeping sub-minimum wage rates is that the EU directive on adequate minimum wages requires sub-minimum rates to be in pursuit of a legitimate aim. Under EU law, and the low-pay commission is clear on this, reducing business costs is not a legitimate aim. The problem is that the Taunashta must not have got this memo. When I asked him about it in Eeders' questions earlier, he said the quiet part out loud. He gave an answer for keeping sub-minimum wages that was all about reducing business costs, that is an illegal justification and the Taunashta should withdraw it. In February, the Minister of State said they would decide on this after the economic impact assessment. Now, you do not even have an economic impact assessment and you are already withdrawing it. Stop the excuses, set a date for abolishing sub-minimum rates. So let me tell you because this is the last part. Since the first time I use the time I have to say, I want to tell you that the Stop the 승 decreased, we are thoroughly withdrawing it. He is doing what I want to say after all this is a little bit a little bit. And I will not have time, but I will not have time to tell you that you have to go through that. This is a circumstance. That is a circumstance. So let me say something I saw. And I could say something I was looking for.