GOVERNMENT inspectors have begun policing new legislation which limits the hours young people can work and gives them new employment rights.
The Protection of Young Persons (Employment) Act, which came into force on January 2nd, raises the minimum legal full time working age from 15 to 16. It allows schoolchildren aged 14 and over to perform temporary work for up to 35 hours a week during school holidays and eight hours a week during term time.
Employers convicted of breaching the legislation face fines of up to £1,500 and a further £250 a day for continuing to offend. The Act also gives young persons and their parents, for the first time, the right to take a complaint to a Rights Commissioner or the Employment Appeals Tribunal.
The legislation is "about protecting young people at work and ensuring that young people and their parents put school first", the Minister of State for Labour Affairs, Ms Eithne Fitzgerald, said yesterday. Excessive working during school years reduced the benefit of schooling, she said.
"There is very strong, clear evidence that for young people the quality of their schoolwork determines the quality of their opportunities during their lifetime," said Ms Fitzgerald. "Raising the minimum full time working age will, I hope, encourage young people to stay in school. We know from experience that there is a direct link between long term unemployment and lack of skills."
Staff of the Labour Inspectorate of the Department of Enterprise and Employment visited over 1,000 employers in the past month to outline the new rules, Ms Fitzgerald said. Copies of a booklet giving details of the new a legislation have been sent to every secondary school and to employers of significant numbers of young people.
There are no reliable statistics on the number of young people and schoolchildren who work part time and during school holidays. Ms Fitzgerald estimated that up to a half of 16 and 17 year olds "have some kind of sideline", and that the same number may work during summer school holidays.
The new law allows 16 and 17 year olds to work up to 11 p.m. when there is no school the following morning. Under the old legislation, schoolgoers could only work to 10 p.m. "I thought it was important to have a law that young people could respect," she said.