A clampdown on pension abuses in the construction industry was called for yesterday by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (Ictu) in talks on a new partnership deal.
The call coincided with a warning by the Pensions Ombudsman, Paul Kenny, that up to 130,000 construction workers have no pension, sick pay or life assurance cover because their employers are failing to meet their legal obligations.
His warning was based on the findings of a study for the Pensions Board by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, details of which were first reported in The Irish Times last September.
The report found that up to 70,000 building workers were not covered by the industry's mandatory pension scheme because they were incorrectly classified as self-employed.
Mr Kenny said a further 50,000 PAYE workers had not been registered in the scheme, despite a legal requirement on employers to do so.
The Mercer report recommended that the Construction Industry Monitoring Agency (CIMA), an employer-union body set up to patrol the scheme, be given new statutory powers to enforce compliance.
Cases are currently dealt with by the Labour Court, but there is a backlog of 400 complaints, Mr Kenny said.
The call for new powers for CIMA was backed yesterday by Ictu in its talks with employers and the Government on a possible new national agreement. In a document presented at the talks, Ictu said the construction industry had "specific problems" which needed to be addressed as part of a package of enforcement measures on employment standards.
It also called for new legislation in a range of areas to prevent unfair redundancies and the displacement of workers by others on lower rates of pay.
However, employers' body Ibec said the report this week by AIB on the impact of migrant workers on the economy had shown there was no evidence of displacement.
In a position paper distributed at the talks, Ibec said any new agreement must accept the "changed economic fundamentals of our post-catch-up period".
"It must result in a restoration of the competitiveness of Irish business and increasing productivity in the face of increased global competition," the paper said.
It also criticised the trade union movement for the way it had handled the issue of migrant workers to date.
Ibec did not believe it was legitimate for unions to create "an impression of general exploitation" of migrant workers on the one hand, and on the other a sense of concern among people that their jobs might be at risk due to the growing presence of migrant labour.
"Where employment shifts have occurred, this is being absorbed by employment growth in the economy with the creation of 96,000 jobs last year, an expansion of the labour market by 4.7 per cent and an unemployment rate of 4.3 per cent," the Ibec paper said.
