Ladies and gentlemen,
I’d like to thank President Brendan Byrne and the committee of the Irish Labour History Society for the very kind invitation to speak here today.
I’m delighted to address such a distinguished conference.
Gary Granville, who will be speaking shortly, writes in his excellent book, “Dublin 1913: Lockout and Legacy” that the Lockout was “neglected in the writing and teaching of Irish history for most of the past century”.
This is why your scholarship, which underpins this year’s commemoration and conferences like this, is so important.
The lessons of history – particularly from our most painful periods – are too important to ignore.
Padraig Yeates, in the preface to his detailed history of the Lockout, says that 1913 was part of an era in which “trade unionists, employers and politicians were beginning to debate the internationalisation of capital and its consequences” – before, of course, the Great War intervened to bring a shuddering halt to that debate.
But 100 years on, as Padraig notes, issues of globalisation, competition and the social wage are once more at the centre of political dialogue – which is where they should be.
I’d like to touch briefly this morning on the issues of work, wages and welfare – and how the three are inextricably linked in today’s society.
Moving towards full employment
We have entered a phase of national commemoration, rightly looking back to events such as the Lockout.
But this is also the time to look forward, to consider the type of country we want to build from the ashes of the financial crisis.
The troika is about to leave town, and we have to ensure that the bitter mistakes of the past are not repeated.
To me, there is one straightforward policy objective from which a better economy – and society – will emerge.
That is full employment, which I believe must be the overarching goal of economic policy.
Full employment is how we leave austerity in the distant past.
It’s how we increase tax revenue, enhance and maintain a viable social insurance system, reduce welfare expenditure and create room for new investment in key services.
It’s how we create a more productive economy and a more caring society.
But full employment would mean little unless accompanied by a fair wage – and the guarantee of a welfare safety net to fall back upon should things go wrong.
Protecting the safety net:
There is a line in Strumpet City where Mary, wife of Fitz, one of the striking workers, asks herself what will happen if the strike persists.
“But she knew the answer,” the book continues. “She had seen it happen to others countless times before. The homes, piece by piece, would go to the pawnshops…”
If that was fiction serving up reality, the factual reality was the €100,000 of aid sent in the form of money, food and other supplies from Britain.
As the Labour historian Francis Devine notes, there can have been few more emotive occasions than when the food ships landed on the quays of Dublin.
I mentioned earlier Gary’s point that, up until recent decades at least, the Lockout had been broadly neglected.
It is also the case, I believe, that the role played by women during the Lockout has been historically neglected too.
For instance, everyone in this room knows of Delia Larkin, sister of Jim, and the crucial roles she played, both at the forefront of the Irish Women Worker’s Union and in overseeing the soup kitchen at Liberty Hall – feeding the thousands of striking workers and their families.
Yet Delia Larkin is not a name to the forefront of the public consciousness.
But her contribution – as well as those of the other women involved in the massive relief effort – was crucial in keeping families alive at a time when there was no state welfare provision.
Although some initial steps had been taken, Ireland had no welfare state in 1913 that might have protected the workers and their families.
Today in Ireland, we have a strong and deeply-rooted welfare state, which provides a vital safety net for people.
And it’s a €20 billion safety net – while savings have had to be made to reduce the deficit, our welfare state has been protected and preserved through the crisis – a point sometimes missed in the commentary.
But the welfare system must also be a springboard back to work if we are to reach the target of full employment.
This is why, since coming to office, I have focused on transforming the Department from the passive benefits provider of old to an active, engaged and focused organisation that provides employment services for jobseekers.
Every 10,000 we help off the Live Register saves around €95 million in yearly welfare expenditure.
More importantly, it helps families towards financial independence and a better future.
Supporting families in work:
But we don’t just support people when they are out of work.
We support them to stay in work.
That is a point that the critics of the welfare system often miss.
Echoes of the employers’ attitude in 1913 can be heard in those critics’ strident demands that the welfare state should be hollowed out.
But if that were to happen, ironically, it would place extra pressure on many of the major employers they champion so heavily as the model of efficient enterprise.
Those employers are often “efficient” – and I use the word guardedly – because their employees’ wages are being topped up by welfare.
Last year, my Department spent €224 million on Family Income Supplement – a weekly tax-free top-up payment for workers on low pay with children.
Next year, we will spend more than €280 million – despite having to make savings in the overall welfare budget.
At present, more than 40,000 working families with a total of more than 90,000 children benefit from the scheme
FIS makes the crucial difference for them in terms of being better off in work and building a more secure future for their families.
A fairer future:
FIS will continue to be a vital element of my Department’s support structure for families even as we move firmly into recovery.
Because recovery by itself won’t be enough - the world of work is much changed from the era when a job was for life and a single wage was usually enough to provide for a household.
Low wages and zero-hour contracts are now growing features of the modern work environment.
This is a reality which governments across the world now have to grapple with.
It is why I’ve suggested the possibility of introducing a Living Wage in the future.
A Living Wage would be higher than the Minimum Wage, and would provide the income necessary to meet basic needs, including housing and healthcare, on top of items such as food and heating.
Research in London, which has a voluntary Living Wage, has shown that it works for employers, employees and the Exchequer.
In my view, we should consider a gradual phasing-in of a Living Wage.
Like London, it could begin on a voluntary basis – with buy-in from employers.
I have little doubt it would quickly find broad social agreement.
But beyond one single mechanism – albeit a significant one – we need a fundamental shift in wider economic policy too.
In that respect, it is greatly encouraging to see President Obama challenging the very damaging “trickle-down” economic dogma that has held sway in the US since the 1970s.
“Trickle-down” was a con, but for three decades, governments of the right and centre bought it, and inequality thrived.
It was a Lockout of a different, but equally insidious, kind.
Now, Obama is forcibly reminding the world of an older truth: that lasting growth and shared prosperity come from the middle out and not the top down.
Conclusion:
Full employment, a fair wage, and the continued reform and preservation of the welfare safety net – these are ambitious goals.
In striving to get there, the labour movement will have a central role to play, in my view.
Social partnership these days has a very bad name.
Yet Padraig Yeates also makes the point that social partnership is arguably “a more modern and more effective way of exerting industrial muscle and social solidarity on behalf of the weak and the marginalised than
the sympathetic strike ever was”.
It is my own belief that collective bargaining is the best way to address the matters I have touched upon above, so
that State, employers and unions seek to cooperate in their collective best interests rather than clash in nobody’s interest.
In conclusion, I would like to again thank the Society for the invitation here today.
I’m particularly delighted that the Department, through the Community Employment scheme, has been able to support the invaluable work of the Society – with the work of the scheme participants ranging from research and archiving to web design.
I wish you every success with today’s conference and your future work.