MANDATE CALLS FOR EMPLOYERS TO BE LEGALLY OBLIGED TO OFFER MORE CONTRACTED HOURS TO PART-TIME WORKERS
Tuesday 23 June 2026Latest CSO data shows that average retail worker in Ireland earns half of average industrial wage and less than the Living Wage
Mandate has today called for changes to be made to employment laws so that employers are legally obliged to offer more contracted working hours to part-time workers. The call was made at a briefing on the union’s Make Work Pay campaign in Buswells Hotel, Dublin.
At the briefing, Jim Fuery, Mandate’s Assistant General Secretary, explained that – based on recent findings on retail workers’ earnings from the Central Statistics Office – such workers are earning around half of the average industrial wage per week and less than the Living Wage:
“The Living Wage is defined as ‘an adequate income to enable individuals to afford a socially acceptable standard of living’ yet the average retail worker in Ireland isn’t even earning the Living Wage. The biggest causal factor here is the low number of working hours that retail workers experience at just over 27 hours per week.”
Jim Fuery said that research conducted by Mandate amongst its own members throws more light on the issue of low working hours for retail workers
“Our research shows that 75% of our members are on part-time contracts. A significant number of these part-time workers (40%) would like to work more than the hours for which they have been contracted. While the 2018 Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act gives them the right to request more contracted working hours, unfortunatelyemployers are not obliged to accede to such requests even if staff have already been working the hours requested. Our experience on the ground is that while some part-time workers do get the opportunity to get better contracts, many do not due to a mix of management intransigence or the extra hours offered not being compatible with their care responsibilitieslike collecting and looking after school-going children.”
To improve the number of working hours for part-time retail workers and their weekly earnings as a result, Mandate is seeking support through the Make Work Pay campaign from Oireachtas members to have the following amendments made to the 2018 Act:
“Ultimately, the key to retail workers increasing their hours of work and their weekly earnings is transferring the onus of responsibility from workers having to request an increase in working hours – with the outcome dependent on the employers’ whim – to employers being obliged to offer higher contracted hours based on existing work patterns. Such a shift in legal responsibility could have a hugely positive effect for tens of thousands of low-paid retail workers,” Jim Fuery concluded.
