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Agency Workers Directive

20
Sep, 2012

While Agency workers do not have the same employment rights as regular workers, under the EU Directive on Temporary Agency Work, Temporary Agency Workers have the right to equal treatment regarding basic employment conditions. The EU Directive on Temporary Agency Work came into effect on the 5 December 2011. The Directive is transposed into Irish Law by the Protection of Employees (Temporary Agency Work) Act 2012. It provides that all Temporary Agency Workers must have equal treatment with regular workers in respect of hours of work and rest periods; pay and work done by pregnant woman, children and young people. The Act came into effect on the 16 May 2012. Temporary Agency Workers covered by the Act have the right to the same employment conditions as if they had been directly employed by the hirer under a Contract of Employment. The right to equal pay has retrospective effect to the 5 December 2011. The Act applies to Agency Workers employed by an Employment Agency who are assigned to work for a temporary period to another Organisation. The Act may exclude employees under a Managed Service Contract which is a Contract for Services, for example, cleaning, where the Contractor is responsible for managing and delivering the service. The Act does not apply to work done in the course of a Work Placement Scheme or any publicly funded Vocational Training or a Re-training Scheme. Pay is defined as including only basic pay, shift premium, piece rates, over-time premium, unsocial hours premium and Sunday premium. Pay does not include Occupational Pension Schemes, Financial Participation Schemes, Sick Pay Schemes, Benefits-in-Kind or Bonus Payments.

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