industrial relations act 1990

• trade disputes - employees can take industrial relation action only in a dispute related to their job
• legitimate trade disputes - pay and conditions, dismissal or suspension of an employee, if the employer refuses to recognise the union discrimination against an employee and the duties ask of an employee are disagreed upon
• illegal trade disputes - over shop agreements, political issues and disagreements on how the business should be run
• closed shop agreements - the employer will only recognise one union
• secret ballot and weeks' notice - must have a secret ballot before strike action - a simple yes or no with no names should be written to ensure there is no intimidation
• employers must be given a weeks' notice of action - colling off period and permission for strike action must be sought from ICTU
• primary picketing - picket peacefully outside the premises of their business to encourage attention and sympathy - must not be any obstruction or intimidation
• secondary picketing - employees can picket outside another employees helping their strike - under the industrial relations act employees cannot be sued, stopped or arrested and employers cannot sue for loss of income due to peaceful picketing
• judges cannot stop the picketing once it is a legal dispute and garda cannot remove picketers - known as immunity
• the law also established the Labour Relations Commissions now replaced by the workplace relations commission