In a significant High Court judgment, Mr Justice Feeney has held that provisions in legislation establishing Joint Labour Committees (JLCs) system are unconstitutional because they give unfettered discretion to the delegated bodies concerned to decide wage and working conditions. He found:
"A body which has delegated to it a power of subordinate legislation must exercise that power within the limitations which are expressed or necessarily implied in the provisions providing such delegation ... the power to make subordinate legislation should be exercised reasonably. On the facts before the Court that is not what has occurred."
Of central concern to the Court was the powerful nature of the "Employment Relation Order" (ERO), which could be issued by the delegated bodies. In Mr Justice Feeney's view these were matters that, under the Constitution, could only be handled by the Oireachtas:
"Where the consequences are an ERO which is to place an obligation on an employer to apply particular wage rates and conditions of employment which can be enforced by criminal sanction, those rates and conditions must be determined and based upon principles and policies laid down by the Oireachtas and not as determined by a delegated body acting in the absence of stated principles and policies."
The proceedings had been brought by John Grace Fried Chicken of Cork and the Quick Service Food Alliance (a fast food outlet representative body). The Minister for Enterprise, Jobs and Innovation, Richard Bruton, said after the judgment that the Irish Government may introduce interim wage protection for workers, pending the introduction of comprehensive reforms in this area. As the Bulletin went to press, Taoiseach Enda Kenny told the Dáil that it would not be possible to introduce legislation protecting low-paid workers before the summer recess. He also noted that the Attorney General has advised the government that there are no grounds for an appeal against the High Court decision.
Trade union SIPTU said it was "devastated" by the decision and that the judgment "removes the only protection low paid workers had on their wages and conditions". David Begg, the General Secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, said, "There are about 200,000 people now who are facing a somewhat immediate uncertain future until substantive legislation is brought in." Head of Policy at the National Women's Council of Ireland, Orla O'Connor, said, "The majority of low waged workers are women struggling to help their families survive. Unless we see decisive action to protect their incomes and conditions of work government sentiments about valuing all workers equally will amount to nothing more than empty rhetoric."
However, the ruling was broadly welcomed by business groups, with Director of Industrial Relations at IBEC, Brendan McGinty saying, "The contractual entitlements of workers on the JLC system, where they have stipulated terms and conditions in their contracts of employment, as they were last week remain intact this week".
Click here to read the High Court judgment in full.
Click here to read a piece from the Irish Examiner on the case.