Unions urge Government to protect worker leave

Unions urge Government to protect worker leave entitlements

The Council of Trade Unions is calling on the Government to do the right thing by workers, pending its imminent decisions following the review of the Holidays Act.

The Review has a number of split recommendations between employers and unions on the group that mark the difference between retaining or reducing entitlements to both holiday pay and sick leave, CTU President Helen Kelly said.

“Going into the review the Minister of Labour assured us that she was not going to reduce current entitlements and even included this guarantee in the terms of reference,” said Kelly. “However the employers have made recommendations in the review which will reduce a worker’s entitlement to the current 5 days sick leave, will mean workers get paid less than their normal pay when they go on holiday, and mean workers that work on a statutory holiday miss out on having an alternative day’s leave. We have not had any reassurance that the Minister will ignore these recommendations and are now calling on her to stick to her word.”

“The CTU entered into the review in good faith according to the terms of reference. We co-operated in dealing with some real issues around the complications some employers face in calculating payments for some types of leave, and we put up changes that all of the group felt would resolve those issues. We were very disappointed when the employer representatives on the review broke the consensus and added additional elements to the proposals which will not only increase the confusion but will reduce entitlements.”

“It is also likely the Government will determine to allow the sale of the fourth week’s annual leave which is also of a concern to us. While we oppose this strenuously it was at least included in the terms of reference. To use this opportunity to reduce other very basic core statutory entitlements such as the 5 days per year sick leave would be a breach of faith with the process and send a very bad message about where government priorities lie.”

ENDS

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