Once again the members of the National Ambulance Service Representative Association, NASRA, are protesting outside the gates because the Department of Health refuses to recognise their union. I plead with the Minister not to tell me that it is an inter-union dispute. For seven years union deductions were taken directly from these workers' wages and went to NASRA. This stopped because the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath, admitted some months ago that the Department of Health would not recognise the union. I have this admission. The Department deals with other unions which the workers must join. They have a banner with the words "My Union, My Choice". The Government stood up for women's choice about what happened to their own bodies. Will it stand up for workers' right to choose the union they want to be in, rather than leaving them outside the gates of Leinster House, where they have appeared regularly since last January? Their union deductions have been stopped. The Department of Health is refusing to recognise the union, yet it includes the majority of paramedics and ambulance drivers throughout the country. Are workers and their rights invisible to the Government? It recognises wealthy people, for whom it does lots of favours in the budget. Workers need some recognition. Will the Minister get the Department of Health to stop blocking that recognition and deal with the union?

I note that the group outside Leinster House today comprises very professional and committed ambulance paramedics who are highlighting their right to join the union of their choice, not the boss' choice. This issue was raised last June when they were previously outside the gates. The Minister then said he was talking to management in the HSE. An all-party group of Deputies asked for a meeting with the Minister to try to resolve the issue. What is happening? Will the Minister update us on his talks with management? Will he meet the cross-parliamentary group?

We will take brief supplementary questions from Deputies Paul Murphy, Barry and Pringle.

We know the answer we will get to the question Deputy Bríd Smith has asked because we have asked it so many times. It amounts to the Government washing its hands in a situation where an agency for which it is responsible is effectively engaged in union-busting. What signal does it send to private sector employees across the economy when a State agency refuses to engage with one particular union because it does not like how it operates? It is utterly scandalous.

Yesterday there were pickets and protests outside Irish embassies and consulates in Australia, Austria, Britain, Belgium, Greece, Germany, the USA, Sweden, Canada and elsewhere in solidarity with Irish paramedics who were demanding the right to be recognised in the union of their choice. My question is this. Is it the case that these trade unionists and socialists have done more to help paramedics in 24 hours than the Government has done for a year? Will the Government change its position and grant them the democratic right to be represented by the union of their choice and for the union to be recognised by the HSE? More than 500 have made this choice.

I support the comments of my colleague, Deputy Joan Collins. It is vitally important that the Minister act and get the HSE to talk to the Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland. That is what the dispute is about. That cannot be a problem. As one of the signatories to the letter to the Minister, I find this very disappointing. It must be a year since the Minister undertook to talk to us about the issue, but nothing has happened. We have had no contact with him.

Of course, any individual has a right to join any trade union or body that he or she wants to join, but the Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland which is not affiliated to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions has negotiating rights for nurses working in psychiatry and the intellectual disability sector. The clue is in the name. There are three unions which have negotiating rights with the HSE for front-line ambulance staff, namely, the Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union, SIPTU, Fórsa and Unite. They represent all of the ambulance grades. Industrial relations policy has a long-standing objective of avoiding fragmentation of worker representation in public sector employment and the trade union movement more generally. This is meant to facilitate the orderly conduct of bargaining and other aspects of industrial relations. There are three unions for paramedics and ambulance grades that already have negotiating rights-----

They are not the unions the workers chose to join. The question is about choice. Will the Minister, please, answer the question?

The Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland-----

Deputies should, please, allow the Minister to respond.

I have addressed the question fully. The Deputy might not like the answer, but I have addressed the question.

The Minister has not addressed the question of choice.

I have addressed the question fully. There are three unions, Fórsa, SIPTU and Unite, which have negotiating rights. The PNA does not have negotiating rights.

A worker can join any union, but it has to be the right one.