Lord King of Bridgwater
Main Page: Lord King of Bridgwater (Conservative - Life peer)
Lord Clinton-Davis (Lab)
For 30 years, I was president of BALPA, and I notice that the union is very well represented in the Committee today. I beg the Minister to think again about the Bill. Every speech that has been made so far has indicated that the Government ought to think again. We do not know whether the Minister will think again. I plead with her to do so, because this is not an ordinary Bill. It goes to the very heart of what not only the trade union movement or the Labour movement but the whole country thinks about this issue. I hope that the Minister will be more placatory than the Government have indicated so far. I repeat that the Bill is misplaced, as it is written. Therefore, I hope that she will say later on that she is prepared to think again about what the Government are putting forward.
I am very glad that BALPA has set a good example. Although on the whole the executive has been Conservative—there are one or two people who are not, but not many—the important thing about the union is that it is prepared to put aside its political views and think in a way that is representative of the country as a whole. BALPA has done a great deal for British aviation. It is not always right, but on the whole what it has advanced has been for the benefit not only of pilots but of those who use all the airlines in the world. Will the Minister say today that she will think again about the whole virtue and principle of this Bill, which is vitally important?
Lord King of Bridgwater (Con)
My Lords, I rise to make clear right at the start that I strongly support Clauses 2 and 3 in this Bill, and I will describe the reasons why. The amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, obviously impinges on them, so I shall say a word about that.
The amendment refers to introduction of voting by,
“electronic, postal and workplace balloting”.
I am struck by one thing; this was described as the e-voting debate, but I have not heard a single person yet say that they think that workplace ballots should be reintroduced. In my own judgment, that is the reason why in the 1984 Act, which I had the honour of taking through Parliament, we introduced compulsory postal voting. I am not at all persuaded of the idea that you can get safely back to workplace ballots without intimidation or corruption in certain areas.
There is a need for trade unions, government and the public estate to carry public confidence at all times. If their lives are to be significantly inconvenienced, and in some ways seriously inconvenienced, with great personal distress, there should be proper protection for those people. As has been said already, striking should be only the last resort. That is in the interests of the union members themselves, for whom it may be a very expensive operation that may involve significant loss. They should never be taken out on strike by union leaders except as a last resort. But at all times we have protected that last resort of the right to strike, as was rightly said by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. It is the ultimate freedom—the right that people have under the law.
We talk about trade unions in general as if we were talking about—
Lord King of Bridgwater
May I just finish this point and then I shall give way? We are talking also about the change in the number of strikes. What is very significant is—and the right reverend Prelate referred to 50 years ago being on the shop floor, or maybe in a more senior position at Land Rover—that it was a very different world indeed. The world was very conscious at that time of strikes in the car industry. The noble Lord, Lord Monks, paid an indirect tribute to the progress that had been made under Conservative legislation. He pointed to the much more constructive industrial relations that now exist between the workforce and the management, which has been a major factor and a key to the success of our car industry at the present time. I give way to the noble Lord.
Lord Morris of Handsworth
I thank the noble Lord. I have great respect for his views but the debate that we are having is not about strikes; it is about a method of voting.
Lord King of Bridgwater
The point is: how do you maximise voting? It is very important that the public have confidence in the number of votes cast in these situations. The latest figure I saw, if it is correct, showed that there are now seven times as many strikes in the public sector as in the private sector. Public sector industries tend to be monopolies and you do not have to live long in London to see that a public sector or monopoly strike, such as happens, sadly, on the Underground and perhaps on the buses, can cause huge disruption and distress for millions of people. This is an issue for Parliament; it is not a party issue. We all have a duty to ensure that the public have the correct protection without preventing the right of a trade union in the final analysis to use its ultimate right to strike. I make that point very clearly. There must be a maximisation of that vote, without corruption and intimidation. It must be a full and correct vote.
The noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, piloted electronic voting in Sheffield in 2007 and that is very impressive. I wonder how many people in Sheffield at that time were really familiar with the internet and whether the electronic possibilities had spread to the extent that they obviously have now. What has come with that spread is a far greater threat from the corruption of the internet itself. Everybody knows the challenges of cyber. It is a major defence issue now. We now know that nothing is secure against a cyberattack and the problems associated with hacking are much more prevalent. That is not an argument against electronic voting—before everybody sucks their teeth and thinks I am about to oppose it. I actually think we should bring in electronic voting, but we must do it with our eyes open to the fact that there are now far more risks than existed in 2007.
I think the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, will accept that there are now far more challenges and difficulties. I do not think many people outside realise just how insecure those systems are and just how professional different organisations and Governments are which do not bear us any good will and are interested in corrupting and damaging our systems. So if we are going to go ahead with electronic voting, we have to do it after the most careful examination of the challenges, because the worst thing to do would be to introduce electronic voting and then find that it does not work because it is corrupt. That would bring discredit on the whole system.
I do not claim to be an expert on the Central Arbitration Committee and whether that is the best body to do this, but one line in the amendment worries me. It states:
“Subsection (1) shall not come into force until—”.
I worry that this is trying to kick the whole thing out and that it might be used as a device to prevent Clauses 2 and 3 from coming into effect. The noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, gave a very helpful speech making it quite clear that it is not his intention to do that, but there is an alternative way to proceed. The Secretary of State has the power under existing legislation, if he wishes to use it, to introduce electronic voting after a proper examination of these issues. That is the alternative way to go.
This is Committee. We shall no doubt return to these issues on Report, but I put that thought to the Minister as a possible way to proceed. I do not want to find that we have delays. If there could be proper consideration and the best possible examination of this by bodies really capable of really examining these very difficult issues that now surround the electronic world, I would support it in the interests of maximising the voting possibility because—my noble friend Lord Balfe made this point very well—the fullest turnout is the best safeguard against the wrong result. Active minorities working against idle majorities is the danger we have to guard against. We need the maximum commitment and the maximum vote in these situations. If electronic voting genuinely free from corruption and distortion can be made to work, I would support it.
Baroness Prosser (Lab)
My Lords, I want to raise a couple of points that are rather different from those which we have heard thus far.
First, what is the purpose of this legislation? What is the purpose of the Government’s proposal to increase the thresholds for turnout and participation, when we have not heard an inkling about their interest in enabling that increased participation to take place? Many noble Lords have already spoken about using electronic voting. It would be a real step forward and really interesting and heart-warming if the Government were prepared to say that they are prepared to trial it, look at it and to set up a group to study it, but thus far they have said nothing. That makes me very suspicious about the real intention behind the proposal. Could it be that the Government do not want an increase in thresholds to come about? Do they really want more participation, or is this a way of demonstrating that they do not want any strikes, particularly in the public sector, without actually saying that they do not want any strikes, particularly in the public sector?
The noble Lord, Lord King, said that nobody thus far has mentioned workplace voting. I know there is a range of issues and problems, but it might well be useful to take a look at whether, in certain circumstances and certain kinds of workplaces, workplace balloting would be appropriate. However, it seems to me that none of this is the object of the Bill. Increasingly, it looks as though it is an exercise in how to ban strikes without actually banning them. It is very clever. It saves all that performance of perhaps having to face legislation—all the global public opprobrium that would be likely to come from the ILO and others if strikes were banned. It makes it so difficult that most attempts at industrial action would fail. That is how it reads and that is how it is going to work out, it seems to me, if we do not have some measure of understanding from the Government about what is actually being suggested.
I am moved to comment in this way because this is not the only legislation or policy we have had in recent times which makes it appear that the Government are trying to close down voices of opposition. I mentioned at Second Reading the areas where this dismissal of opposition has become apparent. For example, there is English votes for English laws: of course, no pesky Scottish National Party is going to get in the way of things. There are the Boundary Commission’s changes to the electoral register; proposals elsewhere in the Bill to make it more difficult for unions to return and retain their membership lists, thereby certainly reducing membership income; and changes to unions’ ability to build up and retain funds for political and other forms of campaigning. Further, this weekend we heard that restrictions are to be placed on the charitable sector’s ability to conduct public policy campaigns. All that adds up to a frightening and worrying scenario. It all adds up to political interference. As I said earlier, I believe that it will be seen by many people as a very poor show and by many more as a demonstration of very poor judgment.
Many speakers have spoken in detail about the problems associated with postal ballots and participation and I am not going to repeat what they said. However, if industrial action is being considered, the most important work to be done—by unions and employers—is to engage in debate and try to solve the differences that have led to the industrial relations breakdown. Unfortunately, with one or two very good exceptions, few of the people involved in drawing up this legislation seem to have had any experience of the world of work or, certainly, any knowledge of trade unions.
The noble Lord, Lord King, commented that industrial relations now are very different from those that pertained in the days of “the Rover”, as union members always referred to the factory. That is absolutely correct; but the reasons for those changes are many and various. Not least, the improvement in industrial relations has something to do with having a better-trained management than we ever had in the past.
Lord Kerslake
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her response, in particular her undertaking to reflect further on these issues. There were a large number of contributions—I counted a total of 17; I may have missed some—for which I am very grateful to the House. Recognising the length of the debate, and the fact that there are urgent debates to follow, I will not go through every one of those contributions. I ask noble Lords to bear with me. I shall highlight some of the key points.
There is absolute common agreement in the House about the need to maximise engagement. Nobody is arguing about this. There is absolute agreement in the House, including from the Minister, who spoke just a minute ago, about the principle of using digital means to carry out activities. There is no doubt about that point either. We are left with one question: can it be established that you can do this in a secure way? As a large number of Members said, there is ample evidence of very important transactions that are done securely. They do not get more important than how you manage your banking; perhaps with the exception of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, a lot of us use that method. The crucial point I make is that we do very important and serious things through electronic means. I cannot believe that it is beyond the wit of the House, and, indeed, of the Government, to find ways to ballot for industrial action in the same way.
Lord King of Bridgwater
Would the noble Lord not agree that anybody who has an understanding of the situation in the internet world and its security knows that every responsible bank is extremely worried about being able to maintain security? There are current stories of major companies that have had huge losses of information about their customers. I say to the noble Lord that the ballot on the Mayor of London was a little time back. We need to ensure that we have a fresh look at this in the current climate of risks to security.
Lord Kerslake
The noble Lord is absolutely right that cybersecurity is critical. Indeed, I was going to come on to that. It is critical across every aspect of digital technology and use of digital systems. In fact, many security systems in this country are highly dependent on tackling cybersecurity issues. There is no doubt that we need to deal with it. I venture to suggest that, in comparison with those risks and issues, the risks associated with electronic balloting for potential strike action may not be quite as big.
The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, made a powerful argument about how this issue sits in the wider context of balance and proportionality as the Bill is taken forward. We are applying quite significant thresholds. Have we done everything possible to enable unions to achieve that turnout? Are we acting in a proportionate and balanced way? That is critical. In many ways, the amendment may well save the Government from themselves and a potential successful legal challenge in the future.
I will finish with two points. First, the whole purpose of my amendment is to actively and independently look at issues of security. I am 100% persuaded that we can have sufficiently secure electronic balloting, and, indeed, workplace balloting, which, as has been said, happens now through the CAC. Secondly, the purpose of my amendment is to look at this issue through an independent process. Let us not put it above the principle of thresholds, as the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, said, but if we put these thresholds in place, we should reasonably and independently explore the question and report back to the House.
This is most definitely not a manoeuvre to delay the Bill. In fact, I have put a time limit of two months in which to carry out the work, which should be more than ample to do work of this nature. Therefore, this is not about saying that we have definitive answers—although I personally think we do—but that we should properly and independently test this issue.
My last point goes to the argument made by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester. Ultimately, this is about fairness. Are we acting in a fair way in the changes we are making, which affect a very important issue in this country: the right to strike? That should be our determination and, if we believe that that is the core of this issue, the amendment is entirely reasonable. I really hope the Minister will think about how we might do this. Given her very constructive commitment to think seriously about this issue, I will of course withdraw the amendment and hope to have further conversations on this issue.