The Tanaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Ms Harney, has received a petition signed by 25,000 people calling for the implementation of a minimum wage of £5 an hour for every worker aged 19 or over. The petition was handed in to her office yesterday by the Socialist Party.
The petition was collected over the past five weeks in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Wexford, Drogheda and Sligo. The party's TD, Mr Joe Higgins, said that while the new legislation on a National Minimum Wage was being amended to exclude items such as tips and gratuities in calculating wage rates it still fell far short of what was necessary.
The hourly rate in the new Bill is £4.40p per hour for adult workers and 70 per cent of that for juveniles and new entrants to the workforce.