As they marched to the Dáil today, Debenhams workers chanted, "Apple got sorted out. We got sold out." The Taoiseach supported the successful appeal against Apple paying the State €13 billion. The Debenhams workers are campaigning for the far smaller sum of €13 million but the Government is taking no action on their behalf. This €13 million is the sum necessary to provide almost 1,000 Debenhams workers with two weeks' statutory redundancy and two weeks per year of service to top it up. To try to win this modest sum, these workers are forced to resort to picketing the 11 Debenhams stores in the Republic of Ireland. It might be more accurate for me to say these shops are being blockaded. They are being picketed around the clock with a view to blocking any attempt to remove stock. The workers understand that liquidation law, framed by the Taoiseach's party and Fine Gael, leaves them way down the pecking order and that they are very unlikely to have their redundancy pay topped up by the liquidator. As the dispute approaches its 100th day this Saturday, blockading the stock in the stores is the one bargaining chip left to these workers and they intend to use it.

I have listened carefully to the Taoiseach's comments on this issue over the past eight days. He offers sympathy on the workers' plight. He downplays the possibility of workers receiving more than the statutory redundancy. He promises the possibility of law reform to improve workers' rights in liquidation situations but only after a review and, implicitly, quite some time later in the lifetime of the Government. To be blunt, this is not going to cut it with these workers. As the acting shop steward for the Blanchardstown store, Ann Peppard, said outside the Dáil less than an hour ago, Micheál Martin's sympathy will not pay her mortgage.

They know that Debenhams can afford to make a just settlement. They know Debenhams has 122 stores currently trading in the UK and that the UK parent company has profited from online sales sourced in the Republic of Ireland every day since the Irish stores closed. They are digging in for a better deal. I honestly do not see how the liquidator will get that stock out. I am certain sure that the threat of arrest will not work. I cannot see court injunctions working either. Sooner or later, the Government will have to intervene here. The Taoiseach was part of a Government that introduced emergency legislation in 2008 when it rushed through the bank guarantee, which ended up costing the taxpayer €64 billion. Is he telling us that whereas emergency legislation for bankers was introduced in 2008 he cannot introduce it for workers in 2020?

A total of €5 million is owed to the Revenue by Debenhams. Is the Taoiseach prepared to say this €5 million should be used towards providing these workers with that basic decent redundancy settlement of two weeks plus two?

On the Deputy's opening statement on Apple getting sorted and so on, Apple did not get sorted. Apple is also about workers. Apple has been in Ireland since 1980 and the court decision is that there was no state aid to Apple. This is the essential point that the court decided. Apple now employs 6,000 people throughout the country. This is important. There has been an ongoing view from the Deputy and others consistently undermining the role of multinational companies in Ireland. I want to put on the record that it is an important role. It underpins the work of many small to medium sized companies that also create thousands of jobs. There are hundreds of thousands of jobs involved in companies such as Apple. It was important in terms of protecting the industrial policy of the past 30 or 40 years, in my view, to identify the State's credibility and reputation whereby we do things within the law.

That said, with regard to Debenhams workers I will not commit to something I cannot legally deliver. I will not do that in the House. I have said before that the treatment of the workers by Debenhams was unacceptable and wrong and that the law does need to change. This in itself will not benefit the workers themselves. The State has to do everything it possibly can through its various schemes and mechanisms to support the workers. Ideally, we can secure alternative employment and provide a range of other supports over and above income supports to help the workers. There is a long-established position in terms of statutory redundancy being the State's mechanism to support workers in this situation. This still holds. That said, this does not in itself provide satisfaction for the workers because they are being denied justice by the company. The company's behaviour has been disreputable and wrong. It has not treated workers with the dignity or respect they deserve or given them supports..

This dispute is now an historic dispute, as it is the first dispute of the coronavirus lockdown. The flagship store for Debenhams is on Henry Street in Dublin, the scene of another historic strike, the Dunnes Stores anti-apartheid strike in the mid-1980s. That dispute was resolved by a Government introducing legislation that in name may not have been emergency legislation but effectively was special legislation, taking apartheid South African goods off the shelves. There is a deadlock in this dispute. There is a risk of arrest and court injunctions facing these workers. The Government will have to intervene.

Legislation must be introduced to resolve it. The Taoiseach said that he hoped alternative employment could be secured for the workers. That is an interesting point, but it has just been thrown out and left hanging. Can he be a little more specific about what he means and what actions he is prepared to take in that regard?

Finally, next Saturday will be the 100th day of this dispute, but in that 100 days the Taoiseach has yet to meet a delegation of Debenhams workers. The workers would like him to meet them. Is the Taoiseach prepared to meet a delegation of Debenhams workers to discuss the issues they are facing?

First, I did participate in a Zoom meeting with Debenhams workers, and the Deputy should know that. Of course, I will meet a delegation of the workers. There is no difficulty whatsoever. I have communicated with workers in my constituency in that regard. The difficulty I have is that in situations such as this I am very reluctant to create false expectations and false hopes for people who are going through a traumatic time after losing their work in such unacceptable circumstances. The Deputy can stand here and say that we should introduce emergency legislation without specifying what he has in mind or whether it is tenable or sustainable.

In terms of my remarks about the State using all its apparatus to support workers, I recall being Minister with responsibility for enterprise when Motorola closed in Cork resulting in the loss of 400 to 500 jobs. We marshalled all the agencies ranging from Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland to what was then FÁS to work with the workers collectively and individually to make a new start and get people jobs. That was an interesting study in itself because many new companies were born out of that experience. However, it took a fair degree of collaboration between State agencies working with the workers in that tech sector, and there were good outcomes in that respect. I am always of the view that the State should work with workers who have been made redundant to ensure it can secure alternative employment and give whatever supports the State has available to help workers to reskill, retrain or gain employment elsewhere.