(1) Where an employee alleges that he or she is being prejudiced by a reduction in his or her hours of work without a concomitant reduction in duties or amount of work, because of an increased liability of the employer resulting from the passing of this Act or the declaration of a national minimum hourly rate of pay, and the employer, within 2 weeks of being so requested by the employee or the employee's representative with the employee's consent, does not restore the employee's working hours to those obtaining immediately before the reduction, the employer and employee shall, for the purposes of section 24(1), be deemed not to be able to agree on the appropriate entitlement of the employee to pay in accordance with this Act resulting in an alleged underpayment to the employee.

(2) [deleted]

(3) In proceedings under Part 4 of the Workplace Relations Act 2015 in respect of a matter that, by virtue of subsection (1), is a dispute for the purposes of section 24, it shall be presumed unless the contrary is proved on the balance of probabilities that any reduction in hours of work was for the purpose of avoiding the alleged increased liability referred to in subsection (1).