Trade Union Bill

Lord King of Bridgwater Excerpts

Wednesday 10th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord King of Bridgwater (Con)]

My Lords, the House has great respect for the noble Baroness the Leader of the Opposition and for the speech that she has just made about amendments whose effect would be that these proposals would come in but over a longer timescale. Although she then dealt with the core issues behind the amendments—I understand entirely why in her position she felt it necessary to do so—this Committee is in some difficulty with the way in which the amendments have been grouped.

I had not intended to speak until I had heard the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Monks, but I have a suggestion to make, although I do not know whether I can persuade him to do this. Would he be prepared to make his speech on his amendment in the debate on this group of amendments? The serious issue here is that the noble Baroness’s amendments deal with contracting in and contracting out but over a different timescale. I do not in any way seek to misrepresent her, but that is the core issue that we need to discuss.

I myself have serious reservations. The noble Baroness will know—she has referred to it—that there is a considerable historical background to this matter, and the noble Lord, Lord Monks, has kindly provided me with material to remind me of the correspondence that I had when this matter arose before. It would be helpful to the progress of business and to the relevance of the speeches that no doubt a number of noble Lords on both sides wish to make if we could deal with the issue in that way. I would not otherwise have intended to speak because this is a more limited amendment on the timeframe in which these changes come in, whereas I want to talk about the general principle.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, this transitional period of three months, during which the trade union member is treated as a contributor to the trade union before they must register the opt-in to the political fund, is clearly punitive and designed to inflict maximum damage on trade union funds.

Much has been said tonight about the Select Committee which is to take evidence on the impact of this legislation on political funding. The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, mentioned this, and I suspect that we may get a contribution from my noble friend Lord Wrigglesworth, who is a member of that committee. We have to await the report, but you do not need a report to understand what this three-month period will achieve.

Let us take the example of the union Unite. It has 1.2 million members whom it has to approach within the three-month period. It has to speak to each one and ask them to opt in. If they do not opt in in time, the union is not empowered to deduct the money. If it does, one presumes that it will be acting illegally.

Labour has proposed a five-year timescale. I wonder whether five years might be a little long but I understand the logic behind it, because within that period every member of the trade union will have the opportunity to renew their membership, and new members of the union will be covered by the opt-in as well.

I do not want to get into the argument of how long the period should be, but I am supportive of the trade unions. If they have to do this, they need time to adapt, just as, if the Conservatives were in the same position regarding donations, we would want them to have a fair period of time in which to make the adjustment.

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[Lord King of Bridgwater]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Monks, for responding to my invitation, which the Committee understood, and I hope that the noble Baroness, whose very proper and powerful speech I fully understood in connection both with the question of the technical amendment she had and the general point that she made as well, will also understand. I thought I might just intervene.

We are in a bit of living history at the moment—I suppose that is how some people would describe me at this time—but it also involves another Member of this House who, sadly, for personal reasons cannot be here tonight; I refer to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit. He and I share responsibility for the actions that we took, in that he was Secretary of State after the election in 1983, inheriting a Conservative manifesto commitment that trades unions must take steps to ensure their members are fully aware of their statutory rights concerning the political levy and are able to exercise them freely. That was in the Conservative manifesto of 1983. Norman Tebbit, as he then was—the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit—who was then Secretary of State for Employment, proposed that, in the absence of such steps by the trades union movement to ensure that members were able to exercise their statutory rights concerning the political levy freely, the Government would introduce measures to guarantee the free and effective right of choice whether to pay the political levy.

Owing to the unfortunate resignation of our, sadly late departed and lamented, noble friend Lord Parkinson, there was a reshuffle in the Government and I then became the Secretary of State for Employment, inheriting these discussions which continued with Mr Lionel Murray—Len Murray, as everyone knew him, who then became Lord Murray. In the Trades Union Congress correspondence that I have, which was kindly provided by the noble Lord, Lord Monks, I see that he is “Lionel Murray”. I must say that his keeping of the TUC correspondence is very much better than my own personal records, which has been a great comfort. The correspondence is from General Secretary Lionel Murray, Deputy General Secretary Norman Willis and Assistant General Secretaries Kenneth Graham and—a promising newcomer—David Lea, who bears a striking resemblance to the noble Lord, Lord Lea, on the Benches opposite.

The position at that time, when I saw the representative of the Trades Union Congress, was that unless we could be sure that every possible step had been taken to ensure that union members were aware of their rights, and had the opportunity to opt out, we would feel it necessary to act in this case. After considerable consultation within the trade union movement—I received a very full submission—I received a copy of the directions that were sent to the general secretaries of all affiliated unions, TUC regional councils and the Wales Trades Union Council. Those recall the conversations with the previous Employment Secretary,

“to explore the steps that trade unions themselves might take to ensure that their members are fully aware of their statutory rights”.

It goes on to say:

“On 19 October, the General Council’s Employment Policy … met the Employment Secretary, whose central criticisms were that some unions with political funds did not take adequate steps to ensure that their members knew that they could contract-out of paying the political levy or how they could do so, and that the practical arrangements for enabling members to contract-out were of doubtful efficiency”.

The submission that came to me goes on to describe the arrangements proposed.

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[Lord Lea of Crondall]

The noble Lord, Lord King, who is a very honourable man, has taken us through the history accurately, as far as I can see. The lacuna at the end is as follows; will he comment on it? If he has information that has come to him, has he given it to the Minister? If he has, it is for the Minister to reply as to why the Government have not raised it with the TUC. As far as I am aware, these matters have not been raised directly, with evidence, between the Government and the TUC.

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

This is a very serious issue—the issue of whether people are being conned, whether a lot of union members are being taken on and where the unions are not abiding by that original undertaking. This is the value of Committee stage; we will move on from Committee and the special committee which is now looking at these issues will, no doubt, consider these matters as well. My understanding, having looked at the impact assessment, is that there are now 5 million members paying the political levy, some £24 million—is that per annum? I am not sure—and some 25 political funds, of which 12 make no mention at all, in their membership, of the political fund. When new membership forms go out to people who are thinking of joining ASLEF, PCS, the RMT and the TSSA, there is absolutely no reference to people’s rights, as new members, to opt out of the political levy.

Let me state my purpose in saying this. I do not know whether it is right or wrong; I have just seen a briefing to that effect and I think it is very important that we should check. I stand by the decision that I took; if it could be shown that there would be absolute observance of the rights of union members in these situations, and if this were honoured, it would certainly strengthen the argument against introducing this proposal. That is my concern.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

I would not normally intervene on the noble Lord, but I have listened with great care and I am grateful: his historical perspective is very helpful to this debate, from a practical point of view. He mentioned three questions in taking us to this point. One concerned the code of practice that he agreed with the late Len Murray: was it observed, did it lapse and what has changed? Those were the questions he asked.

I will ask him whether he thinks there is a fourth valid question: if the Government consider that there is a problem, even along the lines he suggested from the briefing we have all seen—I am not going to question whether it is accurate or not—does he think that the legislation before us is the most cost-effective and admin-effective and efficient way of dealing with it? Or does he think there might be a case, with the TUC and the trade unions, for revisiting the code of practice to see if it needs to be updated in any way, or looked at to ensure that it is being effectively enforced?

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

The noble Baroness raises a serious point. The real difficulty is that others will stand up and say, “We tried that once; we tried the voluntary approach and the evidence is that it was not honoured”. The noble Lord, Lord Monks, speaking to the amendment, argued that we should get back into an improved code of conduct, but there will be many who will say that that approach was tried and it did not work: unions have not observed it and that does not give a lot of encouragement.

[Lord Monks]

This is the kernel of the issue: what is the evidence? I cannot vouch that over 32 years goodness knows how many unions have done everything perfectly. I am not arguing that. I am arguing that today—and it is not because of this particular clause—the four largest unions, with 90% Labour Party membership, are doing it. Those are the only unions I have managed to check since the Minister wrote the letter that the noble Lord is quoting. They have been doing it in different ways from time to time—that is for sure—but their websites are very clear. Unite’s rulebook says:

“All members are encouraged to contribute to the union’s political fund but have the right to request exemption if they wish”.

That is sentence one. Unison, GMB and USDAW’s websites say similar things.

So where is the evidence? It is not on the application form—which, by the way, is not what the statement requires. For new members it does, but there is some flexibility on how to do it. I am satisfied that the websites of these four unions—the only four I have yet had a look at—are in line with the spirit and, more or less, the letter of the statement, though of course we did not have websites 32 years ago. I am satisfied they are in compliance with it. I am happy to discuss that with officials and get it properly researched, but this general blackguarding of unions by saying that they are not carrying out the agreement is disgraceful and I hope that the Government will think again.

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

I think that one of the difficulties with what the noble Lord, Lord Monks, said is that there are undoubtedly an enormous number of people who vote Conservative and are paying a political levy to the Labour Party because of inertia and ignorance. While he has said that it is not technically in the TUC code that a new member should be advised of his rights to opt out of the political levy, I would have thought that, on reflection, he may realise that every new member ought to be aware of their rights.

I do not want to say any more at this stage because we will continue with this issue. I understand the seriousness of this for the Labour Party and I understand why Mr Jack Dromey said what he did in the quote that I gave. It is a very serious issue. It will be difficult to persuade the Government that the previous voluntary code—which I entered into in entirely good faith, and I am sure people from the TUC side did, too—has been honoured and respected by a number of individual unions. I do not just mean in the first five or 10 years after signing but on a continuous basis. Their failure to do that is perhaps why we are discussing this.

[Lord Wrigglesworth (LD)]

My Lords, as my noble friend said, I am a member of the Select Committee looking at Clauses 11 and 12. I had not really intended to intervene in this debate but on the specific amendment moved very eloquently by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, on the three-month transition period, I felt it would be helpful to the Committee to recount some of the evidence that has been given to us since the committee started sitting.

I declare an interest as the national treasurer of the Liberal Democrats over the past four years. I have been involved as a company chairman and company director for much of the past 25 years, but in the dim and distant past I was also a full-time trade union official and therefore have some understanding of the internal organisation, activities and culture of the trade union movement. Indeed, in those companies I have been associated with, we had extremely good relations with the trade unions and worked in partnership with them in a way that I think the best companies always do.

But the debate this evening and all the evidence that has been presented so far demonstrate the truth of the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, when he said that the Bill was a solution searching for a problem. That has been borne out in everything I have seen so far in the consideration of the Bill, both on the Floor of the House and in the Select Committee.

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[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response and her willingness to reflect on some of these issues. I have found this quite an extraordinary debate. The more I think about it, the fact that the Minister did not know of that letter—I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord King, on this point—is amazing, given that that would have been something for her to look at and consider.

This comes back to the impact assessment. I am used to Home Office impact assessments, which often state what other solutions have been considered, why they were rejected and how much they would cost. It seems to me that, on this, no other way forward was ever considered. The amendment that my noble friend Lord Monks put forward is something that the Government should have considered before coming forward with this proposal, particularly if they had known about the arrangements of the noble Lord, Lord King, in 1984.

The Minister has addressed some of the detailed points, and I think she understands that my amendments around implementation are, in essence, probing amendments to try to ascertain the justification for the proposals that the Government have brought forward and the urgency of them. That is the key part that the Minister missed in her response. She should look again at the answers she has given, or I could table some Written Questions, because clearly there are some points missing. On the impact assessment, she admitted—or confessed to your Lordships’ House—that there is uncertainty around the impact. I think that is an honest and candid statement, and I am grateful to the Minister for that. The rationale she gave was that there are concerns about the system because it does not “seem” to work. I find it extraordinary that we get such legislation through because there are concerns that the system does not “seem” to do what we want it to. To me, that is not the way in which legislation should be made.

[Lord King of Bridgwater]

My Lords, the noble Baroness has attacked my noble friend the Minister for the Government apparently not knowing about the agreement reached by me and Len Murray. It is quite interesting, is it not, that this Bill has come clean through the House of Commons, where there are a lot of union members on the Labour side? It is quite clear that every union member on the Labour side in the Commons had forgotten about it as well, which is part of my concern.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

There is a real point in that. I think that there should be longer memories in your Lordships’ House, but perhaps there should be collective memories in government departments. It is one thing knowing in a debate what letters were written and agreements reached many years ago, but when Governments bring forward legislation there is a duty on them to understand what has happened previously on these issues.

I am grateful to the noble Lords who contributed to this debate. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, that I particularly agreed with and enjoyed his contribution. He and I rarely agreed when he was in the Labour Party. He was far to the left of where I was then. I do not doubt his sincerity or loyalty to his new party. He made a very sincere plea to the Minister tonight. I concur with everything he said.

In fact, the only support for the Minister came from the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, who was concerned about my jewellery.