Laws On Agency Workers Equality 'Imposed'

Staff recruited by a private agency are to have the same employment rights as those employed directly by businesses.

The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton is to enact laws soon that will give equal status to agency workers.

With almost immediate effect, the Irish legislation to transpose the EU Directive on Temporary Agency Work is being applied - but without agreement between Social Partners on the possibility of a derogation under Article 5.4 of the Directive.

He has written to employers' representative bodies to confirm that the derogation could have provided a qualifying period before agency workers on relatively short term assignments would be entitled to the same basic pay and working conditions as if they were directly recruited.

Talks have not yielded agreement on such a derogation, which is a matter of regret to the Minister and it is not open to the Government to legislate for a qualifying period, as this was a matter which was placed in the hands of the Social Partners under the terms of the Directive.

Accordingly, the Minister informed the representative bodies that the Directive will become effective on a 'day 1' basis, with no lead-in or qualifying period.

"This means that with effect from 5th December, 2011 all temporary agency workers (35,000 workers or approximately 2% of the active workforce) assigned to a hirer are entitled to equal treatment in terms of basic working and employment conditions as if they had been directly recruited by the hirer in the same job," said a Department of Jobs statement today.

The Government's Bill, when published before Christmas, will confirm this and will define pay for the purposes of the law and will also provide for equal treatment of Temporary Agency Workers.

The Bill will also transpose the provisions that temporary agency workers will also be given rights in relation to access to the collective facilities and amenities of a hirer (e.g. canteen or other similar facilities, childcare facilities and transport services) under the same terms as directly recruited employees and are to be informed about vacant posts.

(BMcC)