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THE LOW PAY Commission has recommended that sub-minimum wages for teenage workers be abolished by 1 January next year.
The Commission, an independent statutory body tasked with making recommendations to Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Peter Burke on the National Minimum Wage, as well as other issues relating to minimum wages, delivered its recommendations today.
The current minimum wage is €12.70 per hour but the National Minimum Wage Acts allow for lower (sub-minimum) rates for those aged under 20.
The minimum wage for those aged 19 is 90% of the current rate, for those aged 18 it is 80% and for those aged 17 and under it is 70%.
Today’s recommendations are for sub-minimum wages to be abolished for each of those age groups.
Alongside those recommendations, the Commission also said that after these rates have been abolished for two years, a study should be conducted to evaluate if there have been “adverse consequences”, in particular for those aged under 18.
“Should a significant adverse outcome be identified, the study should review the full range of policy options available to Government,” the report said.
It said a subsequent follow-up study should be commissioned four or more years later as well.
It further recommended that consideration is given to how employers with “a substantial proportion of young workers in receipt of sub-minimum wages” can be supported during and after the abolition, if the Department does in fact follow through with its proposal.
Responding to the report, Minister Burke thanks the Low Pay Commission for its “considerable work” and said “this is an important and complex issue that will require detailed examination by Government”.
He said his department would now commission an economic impact assessment and seek legal advice regarding recommendations, adding that a decision would be made “in due course”.
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I see speed camera vans on average about once per week. Given these stats why am I not seeing a similar frequency of drink/drug detection checkpoints?
Because catching people for drunk driving doesn’t make easy money
Not enough revenue Pat ,it costs money to man checkpoints where one trained monkey in a van will make thousands per day. They have **** all to do with safety.
Cannabis is a depressant. It slows down brain function in 5 ways.
Reduced coordination
Slower reaction times
Slower information processing
Confusion
Changes in vision, hearing, and time and space perception
People who smoke cannabis ‘think’ they can drive safely but the reality is that the drug has affected their judgement and view of reality.
I remember one time travelling in a van with a friend who had smoked cannabis, he was driving and he drove straight through a roundabout, one of those raised ones with flower beds and kerbing around it.
I remarked:
‘As the crow flies eh Dave’
‘Oh yeah Rory Gallagher, put it on man – thought I heard something back there – hope we don’t have puncture’
I put the Doors Roadhouse Blues on instead.
That’s an interesting synopsis, can you provide a link to any peer reviewed study to back up your claims?
A time traveling van?
It was a story Robert…
I bet the hours fly by in your house
He’s all the time in the world since his mate got that time travelling van.
Cannabis remains in the system for up to six weeks. I don’t think a person can be considered under the influence after the first couple of days…
So the main point is there are very few road accidents. Most crashes are caused by people under the influence or doing stupid things.
That doesn’t follow at all. Detectable levels of most drugs are well below impairment levels. It may well be that many fatalities are as a result of some sort of intoxication, but the data ( at least as presented in this article) simply doesn’t support that conclusion.
@clever jake. I don’t disagree with you at all. That was my point…
Don’t worry. Just keep telling people to slow down. Sure it’ll be grand like.
OR – more than four out of five were caused by people NOT under the influence of drugs!
Illegal drugs, 4 out of 5 were drunk
Why is cannibis illegal it contains no toxins unlike alcohal
Are you reading this littleone
I’ve also got a question that will get plenty of red thumbs but are these statistics for the people who caused an accident or for everyone that died. If I’m in a passenger seat of a car and high as a kite but the driver is sober and we crash and both die does that go down as fifty percent of us had taken drugs? Are alcohol related deaths measured as above the legal limit or if you had minimal alcohol in your system. I was told by a detective friend once that if any party in a car is killed in an accident and had been drinking then it is recorded as an alcohol related death. I’m just curious as to how these statistics are compiled.
How hard would it be for a car manufacturer to set it up that if someone is sitting on a seat and the seat belt is not on that the car won’t start? They can already sense a person in a seat for the airbags and no when the seat belt is not closed so surely it’s not hard to make the last bit happen.
have your say