Enterprise Bill [Lords]

Albert Owen Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi). This is a big, clunky Bill that covers four Departments, but today we have the captain of the ship, the Minister for Small Business, Industry and Enterprise, to take it through on her own. She is the sole survivor on the Government Front Bench. I hope that she will be a listening Minister, and will show that when she responds to the debate.

This is not an inspiring Bill, as many have said, but it does support apprentices, and I welcome that. The provisions in part 7 on industrial development will assist the roll-out of telecommunications and broadband to reflect the economic realities of the 21st century. My main issue is with part 8, which covers the restrictions on exit payments.

On apprentices, I am sure that we all agree that training and providing young people with skills and workplace experience is a good thing, but it is vital that we have real training for real apprentices, and that we have real skills for the future. We should not consider the targets alone; we should consider not just the quantity but the quality of apprenticeship schemes.

Part 4 applies mainly to apprenticeships in England, but some provisions apply to England and Wales. Indeed, the Employment and Training Act 1973 applies to Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. Contracts for apprenticeships are contracts for employment as defined in the Employment Rights Act 1996, so conditions for apprentices are UK-wide. English votes for English law might apply to the Bill, so I want clarification from the Minister on that point. I know that now is not the time to go over the anomalies of EVEL, but it is important that there is clarification because of the cross-border issues. People in Wales might have apprenticeships with companies in England, and such provisions would therefore apply to them. However, it is good that the Government are valuing apprenticeships and I support them on that.

The provisions on industrial development allow financial assistance of £10 million to £30 million to be given to projects under section 8 of the Industrial Development Act 1982 without a resolution from the House of Commons. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) said, that is a good thing, but a very small thing. Again, I want clarification from the Minister—who is concentrating, I am sure—that this applies to Welsh Ministers. If it is a UK project in Wales, will Welsh Ministers have the resources to roll out broadband in Wales?

I welcome these provisions, which are designed to get telecommunications rolled out across the United Kingdom. I have long been an advocate of universal broadband and I welcome the Prime Minister and the Government’s U-turn on universal coverage. From time to time—[Interruption.] The Minister says “What?”, but if she had listened to Department for Culture, Media and Sport Ministers she would have known that they were dead against it up until Christmas, and that they have now changed their minds. I hope that roll-out will now happen. I would like a pilot scheme on the Isle of Anglesey. It is an ideal place to have it: an island community on the periphery of this country. If it works there, it can be rolled out across the rest of the United Kingdom.

The Bill will cap exit payments, and that is important. The proposal is designed for city hall chief executives, but the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi) was wrong to say that it will apply just to fat cats. Nurses are not fat cats, and workers on nuclear installations in my constituency are not fat cats. We need to look at this issue.

The Treasury has the power to restrict the public sector workers covered by this measure. I would add to the list of exclusions, which already includes employees of the Royal Bank of Scotland, the Magnox employees in my constituency, who do difficult, dangerous nuclear decommissioning work. They have been caught up in this because the ONS deems them to be in the public sector. The Secretary of State said, “We don’t listen to the ONS.” I would ask the Government to look at exemptions for Magnox workers. There are 23 constituencies that have Magnox estate, with Magnox workers, in them—14 are Conservative, five are Labour, three are Scottish National party and one is Plaid Cymru, so this is not a partisan trade union issue. This is indeed important.

These workers feel let down. One of the 120 constituents who have written to me said:

“To retain highly skilled workers in the nuclear sector, employees were promised that their contractual employment and pension arrangements would be safeguarded”.

If the Bill passes in its present form and does not exempt Magnox workers, they will be unfairly penalised. I think that that is an unintended consequence of the Bill, which is, as I said, intended to get the so-called fat cats. However, I am talking about decent, hard-working men and women on the Magnox estate who have been in the sector for a long time. When they negotiated their wages and their terms and conditions, they would often forgo wage increases to better their pension pots. They feel let down that the Government are looking to take away their conditions of service.

[Kevin Brennan]

Is it not also important to note not just that these workers should be classified by the ONS as being in the private sector, but that they are in fact private sector workers, yet they are being caught up in this Bill very unfairly?

[Albert Owen]

Yes, the Government recently put the estate out to tender, and it was won by a private company. Although, technically, these are Magnox workers, they work for various private companies in the decommissioning sector. I do think that this is an unintended consequence.

I ask the Minister to talk with her Treasury colleagues about this issue to get an exemption. Leaving this to mandarins in the Treasury is not good enough. Magnox workers feel let down by the Government, and the Government can and should act to exempt them from the Bill. I repeat: they are not fat cats, but decent workers.

If I had more time, I could talk about the Green Investment Bank, which I supported under the last Government. I worry about its privatisation, and my concerns about moving it to the private sector are very real.

I am surprised to see Sunday trading as part of this process. We should have a proper debate about the issue, and it should have been in the Bill so that we could see exactly what the proposals entail. The public do not want changes, although some businesses do, and I understand that. However, I think we have the balance right as it stands now on Sunday trading, and that is why I oppose changes to leave decisions on Sunday trading to individual areas. We should keep Sunday special—that is what the House agreed when it had the opportunity to have a full debate, but it has been denied that opportunity now.

Let us get those exemptions for workers, let us support apprentices and let us roll out broadband through grants.