Employment Tribunals Act 1996 (Tribunal Composition) Order 2012
Debate between Baroness Gibson of Market Rasen and Lord Jones of Birmingham
Lord Jones of Birmingham
“Not on my watch, guv’nor”. I was not at the CBI when that fight went on. That was the bailiwick of the noble Lord, Lord Turner, not mine. I always said, and I stand by this today, that it was a good thing to do, but the wage should never be set so high that people felt they could not afford it or it was inflationary. Because it has always been implemented very wisely, it has never had those two problems. We were fortunate that the economy had that Goldilocks aspect to it for many years after it was introduced. Many an alarmist employer would have said, “This will be the end of life as we know it”, but certainly not this one.
I am not saying that if this measure is not introduced, inward investors will not invest or small businesses will stop employing. We are not in that alarmist territory at all. All I am saying is that making it more flexible will create some jobs. We must start looking after those out of work and getting them into work, instead of only looking after those in work.
I am in favour of judges sitting alone, but only with the caveat that it is discretionary, that it will not always apply and that it will be left in the hands of the judge to decide every day. We have to get as much value for money as possible out of the system; we must not delay, obfuscate or obstruct. I would like to think that most cases will be heard with two lay people sitting with the judge. I think that will happen a lot and I am pleased that it will. But the judge should be given discretion. I will not fall for the argument that for some reason employment law is so special, specialised and expertise-driven that judges are not qualified to do this on their own. To my knowledge, most judges are not murderers, and yet they preside over murder trials without experts on either side. This is a special field, but so are many others.
Over the past 15 years we have lived through the continuing encroachment of employment legislation. I would love to know what the increase in employment tribunal hearings has been in the past 10 years. I do not know what it is, so I hope the Minister can provide me with that information. How many of those tribunals have involved people in the first or second year of their employment? I would love to know that. However, whatever those figures are, I know that a greater number of employment cases never get to a tribunal as the parties settle. The noble Lord, Lord Monks, said that good employers who have a good case will win at a tribunal. He is right, but the problem is the employer never gets there for anyone to find out. It is in a business’s interests to settle as that stops it committing further resources, time and money to the case. That smacks of blackmail and of saying, “We won’t let the system work no matter how well meaning it is because it is in the interests of wealth creation to get rid of a case”. You thereby create a compensation culture, which is surely what we have to avoid at a time when we need to get some wonderfully skilled people into the world of work for the first time in their lives. If this provision goes just a little way down the path of doing that, it may not be an answer to a maiden’s prayer but it will help us look after those who are out of work a bit better.
Baroness Gibson of Market Rasen
My Lords, I do not have the expertise in this area that many of my colleagues on this side of the Committee have. However, I am a former trade union official, as many noble Lords know, and therefore I am very interested in employment legislation. I should declare an interest in that my husband is a member of an employment tribunal. Indeed, he serves on the central London tribunal. I know that the Minister was lucky enough to go to that tribunal and meet members of it last week.
I wish to make two small points. My husband has served on an employment tribunal for a number of years and I have heard about the cases in which he has been involved and have reached my own judgment on what we ought to be doing in the future. Some of what is being proposed is bothering me. I am well aware that when employment tribunals were first introduced there were industrial relations problems in this country. One of the reasons for bringing in employment tribunals was the hope that they would be a more informal way of sorting out the difficulties that arose in industrial relations issues on both sides of industry. By and large, I think they have worked very well over the years. Unfortunately, we may now be heading in the other direction, and that worries me. Two points worry me particularly. The first follows on from what the noble Lord, Lord Jones, said about job creation. Obviously, I am in favour of job creation, particularly given the position the country is in at the moment. The noble Lord talked about small businesses. My background is in small business. My father and both sets of grandparents had small businesses so I am well aware of the difficulties that can arise when taking on even one extra employee.
I am a little surprised about this measure because last October the Government produced their own statistics which showed that only 6 per cent of small and medium-sized enterprises said that employment legislation was a problem in relation to taking on staff. I understand that about 1,100 businesses were consulted. This means that 94 per cent did not say that employment legislation was high on their agenda in terms of difficulties. There were other problems higher up the agenda. I am rather surprised that this issue is being brought up five months later as something that is definitely stopping SMEs taking on even one extra employee. That is something which, as the noble Lord, Lord Jones, said, I would support.
My second point concerns the expertise of those serving on employment tribunals. We in this House have all come here because of our background and expertise in different areas. It is exactly the same with those who serve on tribunals. It is not just important that a judge sits with one lay person from each side of industry to discuss issues and listen to the evidence put before them; the expertise also comes out when they get together in chambers behind closed doors to discuss what they have heard. I have spoken to judges and I know that they value employment tribunal members from both sides of industry. They value the advice of the lay members and they pick up things which, if they sat alone—whether they are a man or a woman—they would not pick up. I cannot see how one person sitting alone would be better than three people in these circumstances. Perhaps the Minister will give a little more detail on why the Government think that one person alone would be better than three.