3 Taking a knife to flawed law By Séamus Dooley


“Do you not have a knife?” asked Mary Mitchell O’Connor as she graciously joined Senator Ivana Bacik in the Dáil bar for a Labour party celebration of the unanimous passing of the Competition


Amendment Act. As minister it must be said that Mitchell


O’Connor had showed considerable flexibility in dealing with the Labour bill. The ministerial amendments strengthened the


legislation and her approach facilitated all party- agreement in the Dáil and Seanad. It was a contrast to our experience of successive


ministers, who had failed to engage with the issue. I t was fit t ing she should have been


photographed with the sponsor of the bill both cutting a celebratory cake but the Acting General Secretary of the NUJ had neglected to bring along a knife. The reception was at the height of the leadership


battle between Simon Coveney and Leo Varadkar. Varadkar subsequently demoted the Minister for


Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation so my joke that Ms Mitchell O’Connor try the Fine Gael party rooms proved prophetic. For the NUJ the all-party support was a


vindication of a campaign which began in Spring 1998, when my predecessor Eoin Ronayne warned the ICTU that moves against the Irish Veterinary Union by the Competition Authority could undermine collective agreements for other unions. Following my appointment as Irish Organiser I


had accompanied Eoin to a meeting of the PNAI (now known as Local Ireland). Their advisor, Tom Hayes had signalled that a claim for an increase in the risible fees for freelance photographers working for provisional papers could breach European competition law. Eoin and I met a now former officer of the


Competition Authority who (off the record) told us we were completely exaggerating the potential for a problem. The legislation was not intended to impede trade unions. The owners were determined that they could not


be part of a criminal conspiracy under Section 4 of the Competition Act 1991. The advice we kept getting was “see no evil,


hear no evil” and don’t approach the Authority least we get an answer we would not like.


NUJ Acting General Secretary Séamus Dooley.


Equity subsequently faced court action from the


Competition Authority. The nub of the matter was simple. The Authority regarded freelance agreements as a form of price fixing and freelances as “undertakings” or small businesses. Regional newspaper owners were off the hook! Following Eoin’s move to the CPSU I replaced


him as Irish Secretary and the struggle for reform of Competition law became my single transferrable speech at ICTU conferences and seminars. We won the vigorous support of Patricia King,


then Congress Vice President, and Esther Lynch, now Confederate Sectary at the ILO. General Secretary David Begg campaigned at the highest level and was offered tea and sympathy but kept plugging away. On one occasion during the 2010 talks an official


wrote of Patricia and Esther thundering across the courtyard of government buildings demanding the wording of a clause on freelance rights in the ascent agreement. His note surfaced in an FOI request by Ronan Brady, one of the group of NUJ freelance activists including Mary Maher and Barry McCall, who kept the flag flying. In 2010 we secured a firm commitment to


legislation but no action was forthcoming. Former Secretary General at the Dept of the


Taoiseach Dermot McCarthy frankly admitted that the clause, in terms of legal advice, had been one of the most expensive ever included in a national programme. It provided legal vindication for our campaign but also showed the level of resistance among the


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