Anti-Racist Workplace Week Address
10 Nov 2005
Workplace discrimination and integration
Address by David Begg, General Secretary,Irish Congress of Trade Unions to
EU Social Partner Conference held in Dublin on 10 November 2005
This event is taking place in the context of Irish Anti-Racism Workplace Week. I am very pleased for the sixth time to be taking part in the events aimed at combating racism in Ireland.
Last week I took part in a major demonstration in this city called to protest against the actions of Irish Ferries in reflagging its vessels to avoid Irish law and replacing its workforce with people paid less than half the minimum wage. Although it is no assistance to open air oratory I made a conscious decision to speak from a script. I did so because I feared misrepresentation at the hands of the right wing press. I am very glad I did because that is preciously what happened.
Mr Alan Ruddock is one of those hired character assains who ply their trade at the behest of Mr Rupert Murdoch. I have no expectations of Mr Ruddock. He is consistent in his vitriol against trade unions and all those who might stand against Mr Murdoch's view of the world. As Max Hastings, former editor of the Telegraph, wrote in his autobiography, "The main objective of newspaper proprietors is to make the world a safe place for rich men".
But on Sunday last Mr Ruddock virtually accused me of racism. He was of course careful not to step over the line of defamation in a legal sense (I think anyway, I have not taken advice on this) but his intent was clear enough. So I take this opportunity to reply in the hope that other journalists will objectively report what I say. I should mention that the text of my remarks last week are available on the Congress web site: www.ictu.ie
So let me recall what I said which was the following:
For all its importance we must realise that the crisis in Irish Ferries is also a harbinger of a larger problem in the wider economy.
If we analyise the evolution of the labour market over the past ten years we can see that it is constructed on two pillars, light touch regulation and minimal enforcement capacity. An example of the thinking informing this policy, which is relevant to Irish Ferries, is the refusal of the Irish government to support the draft EU Directive on Seafarers Rights in 1999. Had that Directive been passed we would not have the problem we are trying to deal with now. And, of course, when the GAMA debacle emerged the regulatory regime was not capable of dealing with it.
This is the background against which the decision was taken to open our labour market to the ten new accession countries of the EU. Ireland, Sweden and the UK were the only countries not to avail of the seven year phasing in period for labour mobility. In effect this means that a labour market of 2m people is open to one of potentially 200m. I might mention in passing that Congress was not consulted about this decision. The government acted at the behest of business and the decision was predicated on everyone behaving themselves. But of course they didn't. Like the "Old sow that eats her farrow" some sections the business community succumbed to greed. They exploited foreign workers and displaced Irish workers all in pursuit of greater profits.
The mantra of Irish business today is "competitiveness". It is, we are told, the cornerstone of the market economy. Business demands total freedom to pursue the goal of competitiveness. But if freedom in the economic sector is not circumscribed within a strong juridical framework which places it at the service of human freedom in its totality, then it has no ethical foundation. Otherwise we may ask if there is any limit - any threshold of decency - beyond which the pursuit of competitiveness will not bring us.
I acknowledge that the many people in the business community would not want this. But a race to the bottom is the logical consequence once the cancer of exploitation infects a business culture where competitiveness is superior to all other considerations.
We have choices to make. An open labour market and minimalist regulation are mutually exclusive options. We can only prevent exploitation, social dumping and a race to the bottom if we have the employment standards and enforcement capability to stop it. This will require a complete reversal of the policy approach that has governed our labour market up to now.
The consequences of not getting our public policy on labour market reform right are potentially very serious. A race to the bottom in employment conditions will almost certainly create social tensions and a misjudged antipathy to foreign workers. Out of that can come space for malevant political forces. This has been the experience of some very stable European countries. We would do well to learn from their experience and be sure not to emulate it.
I am in agreement with Michael McDowell when he says that if we do not get our immigration policy right we may face the same problems that France is facing in 15 years time.
After the events of this week, which revealed our own version of the Morcambe Bay Cockle Pickers incident, can anybody doubt that Irish people are capable of treating their fellow human beings badly?
We have to start thinking in a longer term way about these questions. Immigration is not a short term phenomenon. Significant sectors of our economy could not function without the energy, talent and commitment of non-Irish nationals. Health, horticulture, hospitality and construction come to mind. This realization demands a conscious policy focus from the start on integration of migrants.
The approach to integration is very important. Diversity and multi-culturism must be considered in the context of the need to preserve the values of our social model. There is a danger that the doctrine of multiculturism, if taken to extremes, could produce a group politics to trump the politics of social solidarity. If that happens it opens the way to massive inequality and falling social mobility such that it becomes impossible to articulate any sense of social contract or common purpose once group rights overwhelm the belief in collective efforts and collective responsibilities. The trade union movement has vital role to play in integration by recruiting all workers regardless of nationality and promoting collective action to ensure social justice. Canada is a country that invests massively in promoting integration. Ireland could draw lessons from its experience.
If the Irish people were of a reflective turn of mind they might conclude that it would be safer, more judicious and altogether more honourable to plan for a future where fairness, decency, equality and tolerance governed our workplaces and our society.
I am old enough to remember Enoch Powell's controversial speech on immigration in Britain in the "Sixties". I remember too that the Dockers of London, solid trade unionists to a man, downed tools and marched to the House of Commons to support him. That is not a sight that I want to ever see here!
One reason why I consider Mr Ruddock to be so disingenuous is that during the second Nice referendum campaign some opponents of the Treaty tried to exploit fears about immigration from Eastern Europe. Congress took a strong stand against this and was the first to do so. The "Sunday Times" backed the other side!
The philosophy of trade unionism is that all people are born equal, are endowed with certain fundamental rights and their labour cannot be treated as a commodity in the market system.
This is what I believe and what I will uphold as long as I am General Secretary of Congress.