ICTU legal affairs officer Esther Lynch said the level of employers’ control over issuing and retaining work permits had not been adequately addressed. “Experience shows that this exacerbates an already unequal relationship and can lead to abuse and exploitation,” she said.

The bill aims to improve the ‘labour market test,’ that requires an employer to demonstrate that a post can’t be filled by a worker from the European Economic Area before a work permit is sanctioned.

ICTU also expressed concern that Enterprise Ireland would have the power to lobby for permits without rigorous safeguards and transparency. It also called for the “grey area” of the role of language schools to be clarified.

ICTU welcomed improvements in the bill, which would allow workers who become undocumented through no fault of their own to be issued with a new employment permit. This problem has been consistently raised by the Migrant Rights Centre of Ireland (MRCI).