Departmental Functions
Dail Éireann — 2022-03-02
============================================================

Richard Boyd Barrett (PBP), Dún Laoghaire

What is also breaking news, is that the Department of Finance told me yesterday that on top of the current rate of inflation of 5.8%, the conflict in Ukraine and the sanctions relating to it are likely to increase inflation by a further 4%. As a result, we are potentially looking at an inflation rate of more than 9%. Against that background, and because I did not make this point earlier, could I ask the Taoiseach to condemn what Aer Lingus and International Airlines Group, IAG, are doing in terms of demanding pay cuts? This from an entity that we subsidised during Covid. I commend the workers on voting overwhelmingly against those pay cuts, particularly - I did not make this point earlier - because IAG, simultaneously gave British Airways workers, the same staff, a 10% pay increase as a reward for what they had done during Covid. That is shocking.
What is the Taoiseach going to do to increase the minimum wage for low-paid workers? I met this week with private security workers who are on less than €12 an hour. Do they not deserve a decent pay increase?

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2022-03-02/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:50:12+00:00
Sitting date: 2022-03-02