Living Wage

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Viscount Younger of Leckie

Monday 9th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My noble friend makes some good points. The only real way of achieving sustainable increases in living standards is through focusing on economic growth, employment and reducing taxes for the low paid, as he said. Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the IMF, said recently that the IMF had,

“underestimated the growth of the UK economy”.

In a significant turnaround, the fund’s latest assessment found that the UK economy had rebounded strongly.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, welcome as the Minister’s support for decent wages is, wages cannot take account of family size. What steps are the Government therefore taking to restore the cuts in child benefit that they have made in order to protect the living standard of low-paid workers with children without subsidising low-paid employers, in the way mentioned by my noble friend Lord Haskel?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

We know that some households, including those with children, are seeing the amount that they spend on food increase but there is much that the Government are doing to resolve this. The Government provide a number of schemes to help the most vulnerable to afford and have access to nutritious foods, such as the Healthy Start scheme and free school meals. However, we also recognise the extremely valuable work of civil society in supporting local communities. There has always been a tradition in this country of voluntary and charity organisations providing support to people, as the noble Baroness will know, in addition to the safety nets that the Government provide.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Viscount Younger of Leckie

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, I appreciated the interesting and moving speeches by the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Pitkeathley, and the brief intervention by my noble friend Lady Tyler focusing on the challenges that parents of disabled children and carers of disabled adults face in balancing their care responsibilities with their working lives.

Being a carer can have a significant impact on an individual’s life. The Government recognise that caring for an individual with a disability can be both physically and emotionally draining. Flexible and supportive working arrangements can make a significant difference to a carer’s life by ensuring that work does not add to the carer’s stress levels. This is why it is important that carers are able to adjust the way they work to allow them to stay in work, because work can be important for a carer’s well-being and income and for maintaining social contacts. As a nation, we cannot afford to lose the talent and skills of carers from the workplace. The Government recognise that caring for disabled people can be a sudden change for an individual. It may be challenging and take a great deal of commitment from an individual to deliver the care and support that is needed.

I reassure noble Lords that my department regularly collects and reviews data on carers to ensure that we are providing the right framework to allow them to participate and thrive in the labour market. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills conducts the workplace employment relations survey and the work-life balance series of surveys which look at the effectiveness of labour market participation policies, such as the right to request flexible working, in supporting carers. The Office for National Statistics also uses the census to analyse carers’ labour market experiences.

These surveys and the evidence they provide informed the recent report on carers from the cross-government task and finish group on carers. This report highlighted the importance of flexible working and recommended that government should continue to promote the benefits of flexible working to employers. All the recommendations of this report have been accepted and are currently being implemented. An additional duty on government to conduct this research and review the provisions for carers is unnecessary because this work is already under way and government regularly collects and reviews this information.

The Government’s approach is to create a fair, flexible and efficient labour market which supports and encourages participation from all. The strategy for carers is to ensure that we create the right framework to allow them to balance their work and caring responsibilities. Clause 113 requires the Government to review the effectiveness of the right to request flexible working against the policy objectives. Supporting carers to remain in work is a key objective of the policy, and I can confirm that this review will include assessing the effectiveness of the right to request flexible working in supporting carers to participate in the labour market.

I understand the noble Baronesses’ intentions behind this amendment, and I hope I have reassured them that the Government are acting to support carers of disabled children and adults to remain in work and are continually reviewing this support to ensure that it meets the needs of carers.

Just before I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment, I wish to change the tone slightly by stating that we have almost reached the end of Report, and on behalf of my noble friend Lord Nash, I will take this opportunity to thank everyone who has spoken today and during earlier sessions on Report. We have had many thoughtful, well informed and constructive debates on a very broad range of issues, and I have welcomed the thorough approach that noble Lords have taken to scrutinising each part of this wide-ranging Bill. I hope that we can address the very few outstanding issues. I also thank the Bill team and all the officials who have supported me, my noble friend Lord Nash and colleagues across different departments for their work.

In the mean time, I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend and to the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, for speaking in support of this amendment at this extremely late hour. I am grateful to the Minister. I thought he made a rather compelling case for my amendment when he spoke about the importance of supporting carers. He talked about enabling them to participate and thrive, but the trouble is that the present situation does not enable them to participate and thrive. I was ultimately very disappointed by the Minister’s response because it is not about simply collecting statistics, but about having a formal, structured review of the case that other countries have now accepted. Therefore I will, of course, withdraw the amendment, but I suspect that it will not be the last amendment which tries to make this case; we will table such an amendment to any legislation that offers the opportunity to do so. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Viscount Younger of Leckie

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Grand Committee

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, the Government understand the intention behind the amendment and I am glad of the opportunity to have this short debate on the issue today. Before I respond to this specific amendment, I should like to take a moment to set out the rationale behind the introduction of shared parental leave and the importance of these changes for families. Bearing in mind the tenor of the comments made earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, about brevity, I shall attempt to be brief.

The restrictions in the current maternity and paternity system are outdated and do not reflect the way in which modern families want to raise their children. They compel mothers to take the bulk of the time off and give fathers no choice but to stay at work in the early stages of their child’s life. This approach maintains the outdated perception that a mother’s place is in the home and a father’s place is at work. It is known to damage women’s career prospects, because employers expect young women to take large amounts of time out of the workplace to raise children. It can also mean that mothers feel unsupported in caring for a child, and fathers do not feel involved in their child’s upbringing.

It is right that mothers are able to take all the leave that they need to recover from birth and to bond with their new baby. However, they should be able to return to work without sacrificing the rest of their leave. This should be available to the family to use in whatever way they choose. For some families, this will mean that the father takes on the majority of the caring responsibilities very shortly after birth. For others, it will mean mixing periods of work with periods of leave to share childcare. This Bill will make this possible for the first time. The introduction of shared parental leave and pay aims to give families flexibility in how they share childcare when they have a baby. The current arrangements are rigid and inflexible, enabling only one parent to take leave at a time and allowing parents only to “take it in turns” to care for their child.

The changes introduced by the Bill will enable parents to take leave in blocks as small as one week and will remove the restriction on parents taking leave together. The Modern Workplaces consultation, which the Government published in May 2011, set out the Government’s ambition for leave to be taken in blocks of less than a week to allow parents to take leave on a part-time basis. Unfortunately, in this instance, this worthy ambition has not been possible. I will explain why.

The UK has one of the most flexible labour markets in the world. UK employment legislation gives employers and employees freedom to agree individual contracts between themselves, without restricting them to set working hours or working patterns. Shared parental leave is flexible. It will allow parents to choose how to share it between themselves and to take leave as an individual right, in discussion with their employer. This variation in working arrangements creates a difficulty when trying to allow shared parental leave and pay to be taken in part-week blocks.

Here, I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, over the mathematical calculations. One parent may have a standard working week of 37 hours a week, or 7.2 hours per day, and their partner may work 16 hours per week working two eight-hour days. Calculating the ratio of the weekly entitlement to shared parental pay that should be paid when an individual takes one day off would be complex for an employer. However, this is magnified when a parent decides to transfer their remaining part-week entitlement to their partner for them to use. It would be even harder for small businesses, without access to an HR resource, to administer. The Government are mindful that shared parental leave and pay will be an innovative system. To add into the new system the facility to take leave and pay in periods of less than a week risks creating significant additional costs and burdens for employers.

The Government instead propose to allow shared parental leave to be taken on a part-time basis, using a principle that is already well used and understood by employers. Under existing maternity leave provisions, mothers are able to return to work for 10 individual working days without ending their maternity leave or losing their entitlement to maternity pay for that week. These are called keep-in-touch, or KIT, days. The Government propose to give parents on shared parental leave additional keep-in-touch-style days to allow part-time working on shared parental leave without affecting entitlement to statutory shared parental pay. It is intended that these days will have a different name in the context of shared parental leave, which I hope addresses one of the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, because the intention for shared parental leave would be different from the intention for maternity leave. The name would reflect the fact that these days can be used to achieve a part-time working pattern or a staggered return from shared parental leave.

The Government are aware that some interested parties, such as the TUC, are concerned that there is no requirement on an employer to pay an employee more than their statutory payment when they are taking a keep-in-touch day. The Government will provide guidance to employers on how to use these provisions and will strongly encourage employers to pay an employee their full contractual rate if they work on a keep–in-touch day.

The Government believe that it is important to maintain the flexibility in keep-in-touch days to allow parents to return to the workplace for short visits. The Government do not wish to discourage these sorts of visits by forcing an employer to pay an employee’s contractual rate. However, where an employee is undertaking work, it is appropriate that that employee is paid accordingly. Keep-in-touch days are entirely discretionary for both an employee and employer to use. An employer cannot insist that an employee uses a keep-in-touch day and an employee cannot insist that their employer allows them to work part-time by using a keep-in-touch day.

As I have mentioned, shared parental leave and pay is an innovative system and will need time to bed down. It is right that proposals for leave and pay to be taken in periods of less than a week should be considered alongside any review of the shared parental leave system. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, asked why we do not take powers in the Bill to allow shared parental leave to be taken on a part-time basis, to be set out, in effect, in regulation. The Government are sympathetic to this proposal but without a clear policy to enable the shared parental leave to be taken part-time, regulations cannot be designed at this time. My department has explored this fully and will continue to consider it as part of the review of shared parental leave.

I hope that reassures the noble Baroness that the Government share her ambition and I ask her to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and my noble friend Lord Stevenson for their support for this amendment. The noble Baroness’s own experience is extremely important in terms of easing children back into childcare.

I will say more about this when I speak to my next amendment but I very much share the Government’s philosophy, as set out by the Minister, on shared parental leave. That is why I am so disappointed that they are not willing to go that little bit further.

I can see that there are administrative difficulties; I am not convinced that they cannot be sorted out. I am slightly encouraged by what the Minister said about changing the name of the keep-in-touch days and sending out guidance to employers about payment. I do not know whether the Minister has any figures now—perhaps he could let me know—on what proportion of such days are paid at present. It would be quite helpful to know that, perhaps before Report, in case we want to come back to this matter.

No one is asking for these regulations to be drafted now. Quite often a Bill will go through and regulations are not drafted for some time afterwards. Would it not be easier to put them in the Bill now? Even if nothing is done until the review takes place, at least they are there without having to legislate again, if by that time it becomes clear that part-time leave is really necessary for the shared parental leave provisions to fulfil the goals that we share with the Government. I hope that the Minister might be willing to think again about that. We are not asking for those regulations to be laid now, simply that the framework is there to enable flexibility in the future. On that basis, I withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, I welcome this debate because it is important to ensure that the changes made by the Bill provide the right framework for modern families and workplaces. I commend the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, on the tremendous work she has done in the field of gender equality, and I know that she speaks from a position of great experience when debating these issues. As we are on the subject of gender equality, the noble Baroness raised the issue of the gender pay gap, quite rightly, through encouraging fathers’ involvement in home life. The Government agree that this is extremely important. That is why we are extending paternity pay powers in this Bill and will look to extend paternity leave and pay at a later date if we need to encourage fathers’ take-up, but I will be saying a little bit more about that later in my comments.

Greater paternal involvement brings enormous benefits to parents and children. Fathers who are engaged in caring for their children early on, as has been mentioned, are much more likely to remain involved as their child grows up. This involvement means that their children benefit from better peer relationships, lower criminality, fewer behavioural problems, higher self-esteem and higher educational attainment and occupational mobility. The Government are aware of the international evidence that demonstrates that fathers are more likely to take leave if it is reserved specifically for them and paid at a higher rate. The Government’s original ambition to extend leave reserved exclusively for fathers was set out in their Modern Workplaces consultation, which has already been pointed out. It consulted on the concept of a so-called “daddy month”, which would have reserved a portion of shared parental leave for fathers in a very similar way to the “father quota” leave entitlement proposed in this amendment.

Unfortunately at this time it is not possible to realise this ambition. The challenging economic circumstances have made such an extension simply unaffordable. Perhaps the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, will not be too surprised when I mirror what was stated in a response in the other place. Now is not the time to place additional burdens on businesses and the Exchequer and I realise that this immediate response will be disappointing to the noble Baroness.

The new system of shared parental leave will give families unprecedented choice about how to share the leave entitlement in the early stages of their child’s life. The Government hope that the flexibility and choice provided by the new system of shared parental leave will mean that fathers will take more time off to care for their children. The Government plan to review the decision on whether to extend paternity leave and pay by using information on the take-up of shared parental leave and pay from the series of surveys on maternity and paternity rights and work-life balance. If fathers are not taking up the new entitlement, the Government will look to extending paternity leave and pay to encourage more fathers to take leave.

The Government are taking powers in this Bill to allow for the extension of paternity pay which would enable the Government to extend paternity leave and pay at a later date through secondary legislation. I want to make that clear to the Committee. To maintain simplicity in the system, the Government consider it more appropriate to extend leave to fathers through an extension of paternity leave rather than introducing a new type of statutory leave which would be complicated to administer. Paternity leave is reserved exclusively for fathers and is already well established and understood by fathers and employers.

The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, mentioned an annual review. An annual review of this policy may not be possible or appropriate. The shared parental leave policy aims to encourage a long-term culture change in the UK to enable and encourage shared parenting in the early months after birth. Any assessment of the outcomes of the policy needs to understand how employee and employer attitudes, as well as behaviours, are changing. There needs to be flexibility in how this is monitored. The best source of information to understand employee attitudes is through surveys of employers and employees. This data take longer to collate to ensure that the survey includes individuals who have experienced shared parental leave. The Government believe that this is the most appropriate information to inform decisions about the effectiveness of the policy.

The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and other noble Lords in the Committee raised a very important issue about culture and the culture change that was necessary. I agree completely that culture change is what we need to see and the Government agree that it is essential. We will provide supporting guidance as soon as we can to help this change happen and to encourage employers and employees to embrace it. The extent to which the culture change we all seek has come about will be a critical part of the review of these reforms once they have had time to bed in.

The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, raised the issue of the father’s quota. If it would help, we will write to her with more details on that, in addition to the letter that I have written. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked why the level of take-up for fathers is estimated at between 2% and 8%. The impact assessment used figures from the maternity and paternity rights survey that I alluded to earlier in which fathers were asked whether they would like to take more time, if it was available. However, those are initial take-up estimates, and we hope that the culture change that I mentioned earlier will encourage a higher take-up in due course.

I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, who is not in her place today, are assured by the commitments that we have made. The Government will review the take-up of shared parental leave by fathers and consider extending paternity leave and pay in due course, to encourage fathers to take shared parental leave. Finally, I can reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, that if paternity leave and pay is extended at a later date, the period within which it can be taken will also be extended. However, I hope, in the mean time, that she will withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Tyler and Lady Meacher, for their support for this amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, made a very important point about the workplace culture. The experience of some of the Nordic countries is that changing the workplace culture is crucial in encouraging fathers to take leave. There is a link between the right to parental leave and changing the culture, and I hope that the department will reflect further on that.

On the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, it seems to me that if both parents were more involved in bringing up their children, it might keep them together. I am not sure whether there is any evidence to support that, but we know that conflicts about who does what in the home and so forth can contribute to breakdown. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Stevenson for going as far as he was able to in the context, as I know he is sympathetic. I think we are all sympathetic, including the Minister. It is frustrating because I feel like the Minister made my case, in a sense, very eloquently, but then drew back from it by refusing to take that extra step.

I think I heard the Minister correctly and that he has made the commitment I asked for, which was that if paternity leave is extended, it can be taken later. The Minister is nodding his head, and it is very helpful to have that on the record. We now know that if paternity leave is extended at a future date, it could be taken—I hope he is saying—at any point during the parental leave period. That will reassure organisations outside that have been campaigning on this.

Unless this is what he proposes to write to me about, the Minister did not respond to my question about what plans the Government have to encourage fathers to take shared parental leave and whether he would give a commitment to consult on such plans and study what has been happening. There is a wealth of expertise—not so much mine but within this network—about what is happening in other countries. Again, I think the Minister is nodding his head, so perhaps I could put into the record that he is prepared to consult with the network of experts about how to achieve this culture change, even if we cannot go the full way in terms of having “daddy leave” in the legislation. The Minister has been nodding and not shaking his head in response to everything I have said. Does he want to say anything more?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I will just confirm that, as part of the review, these issues will be looked at. It is extremely helpful to have the input and the views from the Nordic countries. I suspect that officials are already looking at that but it is helpful to be nudged in the right direction. We will certainly be looking at this in addition to the other aspects of the review.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I thank the Minister, but we do not want to wait for the review in 2017-18 before steps are taken to try to achieve this culture change. The culture change needs to be achieved alongside the introduction of shared parental leave. Again, I hope that a commitment will be made to thinking now about how to make that change, rather than waiting for a formal review. Unless the Minister has anything else he wants to add on this point, I will withdraw the amendment.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I rise only to say to the noble Baroness that I will be happy to continue these discussions with her. I stated earlier that I have not made a commitment to come back before 2018 and I would not want to do that today. Clearly, it is in everyone’s interests to make this work, and I have already said that we need more time than the noble Baroness has indicated in her remarks to ensure that the review comes through. However, we are happy to commit to consulting expert organisations both at home and abroad on how to achieve the culture change, which is something that I alluded to earlier.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

I am grateful to the noble Viscount and for the constructive way in which he has engaged in this debate. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Payday Loans

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Viscount Younger of Leckie

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I am very certain that it will be part of the discussions. I can give no guarantees, but the whole point of the summit is to discuss these important matters further.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, what action will the Government take to ensure that the monthly payment of universal credit on top of benefits now being delayed for a week does not send more people in poverty into the hands of payday lenders, as has been predicted?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

The noble Baroness makes a valuable point on the transition to universal credit. When it is complete, we estimate that there will be approximately 8 million universal credit claims. My colleagues in the DWP and the Treasury are working together to produce the right sort of advice, and they have made clear that some claimants might need additional help to budget. We are working with the advice sector to provide the appropriate advice.