Former Debenhams workers stage protest outside the Dail

A group of former Debenhams workers have protested outside the Dail in the hope of getting a new bill passed that will protect retail workers.

It comes after Dublin TD Mick Barry brought the Companies (Protection of Employees’ Rights in Liquidations) Bill 2021, also called the Debenhams Bill, to the Dail last year.

If passed the new legislation would allow retail workers to be preferential creditors in a liquidation so that they would be paid what they were owed as a priority.

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In April 2020, approximately 1,000 Debenhams workers at 11 Debenhams stores across the county were let go via an email.

Speaking to Dublin Live outside the Dail, former Debenhams worker Valerie Conlon said that they were out today to remind the Government about the promised bill.

She said: “Today we are outside the Dail simply because TD Mick Barry brought in a bill 12 months ago, it was at the second stage of the bill and the Government put it on the shelf for a year.

“So the year is up now today and we’re reminding the Government that the Debenhams staff have not gone away and we are still fighting for the bill to be brought through.”

Valerie said that the situation in retail remains “very volatile”.

She added: “Something has to change at this stage, retail is very volatile at the moment and we don’t want anything happening to other employees what happened to us.”

Also in attendance at the today’s protest were People Before Profit TDs Paul Murphy and Richard Boyd Barrett.

TD Paul Murphy told Dublin Live that the bill should go to the Enterprise and Trade committee and that we can’t allow this situation to happen again.

He said: “If we don’t act on this, if we don’t say workers come first in the case of liquidation- the workers have to be paid from the money the company has, well then precisely as Cleary’s, what’s happened with Debenhams, we’re going to be back here all over again.

“So the struggle of Debenhams workers can’t be in vain, we have to take action and fully implement this law to make sure this can’t happen again.”

The protestors are hoping that the bill is prioritised by the Enterprise and Trade Committee in the near future.

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