Employment Law: Devolution to Scotland

Debate between Angela Crawley and Hywel Williams

Tuesday 6th September 2022 Westminster Hall

[Angela Crawley]

Absolutely. There was ample opportunity when the Lib Dems were in the coalition to transform employment law, and that did not happen.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

rose—

[Angela Crawley]

I want to make some progress, but I will come back to the hon. Member.

There are more and more people in insecure work, more and more people with insecure wages, and more and more people with insecure rights in the workplace. More people are under-employed, and more people are holding down multiple jobs and yet struggling to support themselves. Sadly, more and more people are struggling to invoke their workplace rights and unionise.

In real terms, that means more people have been plunged into in-work poverty and are unable to rely on stable incomes, which is invaluable to those trying to make headway through what will be a bleak winter for many families as we approach a cost of living crisis. The impact of the pandemic is clear, the impact of Brexit is clear, and the impact of this Government’s stagnation and failure to act is blatant. I call on the UK Government to either act now or let the Scottish Government do so. I would love to have every competence that this Government have to bring forward an employment Bill and transform employment rights. They have failed to do so, and they do not appear to want to.

I was deeply disappointed that there was no commitment in the Queen’s Speech to improve workers’ rights. The decision to shelve the employment Bill represents a missed opportunity for this Government to make serious progress on changing employment law. They have missed the opportunity to update policies on flexible working, carers leave and paid miscarriage leave, which I have argued for time and again. They have failed to strengthen protections against workplace sexual harassment and other equalities protections.

The Minister will recall that I have spent many hours in this place calling for the introduction of paid miscarriage leave. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) has pursued relentlessly the right for neonatal leave and pay, and I welcome the Government’s commitment to introduce those measures. I have pursued numerous vehicles in Parliament to try to ensure that the important policy of paid miscarriage leave is introduced but, sadly, I feel I am reaching the end of the road. The policy has cross-party support, yet it has been unable to succeed because of the archaic working practices of this place and this Conservative Government’s failure to commit to legislating on the issue. That reinforces why this system will never work for Scotland. It is becoming clearer by the day that we cannot trust this Conservative Government to prioritise workers’ rights. Instead, we see the further entrenchment of socioeconomic inequality in our society.

Scotland did not vote for Brexit, Scotland did not vote for this Conservative Government—it has not done so for many years—Scotland did not vote for this latest Prime Minister, and Scotland did not vote to roll back workers’ rights and leave the European Union. Yet we find ourselves in a situation where this Government will not act, and our Government want to act but do not have the powers to do so.

[Angela Crawley]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I know that the hon. Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams) wished to intervene too.

[Hywel Williams]

I will make two brief points. I find strange the argument that multinational companies are somehow unable to adapt their practices to the conditions required by individual independent countries. That is a fallacy and a fiction. Let me also point to a particular reversal of rights, which I will refer to in my speech if I am fortunate enough to be called. The Government have demonstrated their hostility by intending to scrap the Trade Union (Wales) Act 2017—a law passed by our Senedd to protect workers in Wales.

Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean and Europe

Debate between Angela Crawley and Hywel Williams

Wednesday 9th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Hywel Williams]

I thank the Minister for that intervention and look forward to his response to my other questions about the VPR scheme. On Monday I asked the Prime Minister a question about that scheme, and said that at the request of many organisations and my constituents I had written to the Immigration Minister in July about the matter. In his reply the Minister referred to the VPR scheme, stating clearly that it

“was designed to focus on need rather than meeting a quota.”

I think that need is a good and humane yardstick. The need in the current circumstances is undoubtedly very large; indeed it is perhaps enormous. Applying need as a principle for action allows for a timely and measured response and for the use of discretion. However, the Prime Minister has announced that we will take 20,000 refugees. I am sure that those people will be in great need, but 20,000 seems to be a fixed number. On Monday I asked him what he will say to the 20,001st person who applies and who has a provable and legitimate need.

[Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP)]

A UNICEF report indicates that at least a quarter of those seeking refuge in Europe are children, and in the first six months of this year more than 106,000 children claimed asylum in Europe, up 75% on last year. The Prime Minister made assurances today during Prime Minister’s questions that Syrian children will not automatically be returned when they are 18. That is a welcome instruction, but we would like assurances because the issue will remain deeply concerning for children who come to this country unaccompanied. Can the Minister provide assurances that they will also be protected?

[Hywel Williams]

I will pose that question to the Minister and thank the hon. Lady—in fact, she is blessed with clairvoyance because I was going to ask that question myself.

I referred to a question that I asked the Prime Minister on Monday about the 20,001st person, and his response was disappointing. Indeed, it was either dismissive or even alarming. He said merely that we should concentrate on the 20,000—that is all he said, period. I am all for concentrating on the 20,000 to the extent of offering entry to as many genuine cases as possible as soon as possible, and not over the five years that the Government intend, but 20,000 looks to me like a quota. Hon. Members will recall what I said about my answer from the Immigration Minister and the VPR scheme being based on need and not a quota. By their very nature quotas inevitably lead to artificial and possibly brutal cut-offs, and pit one person’s genuine need against that of another as they both join the queue. I do not think that is a humane way of doing it.

The Prime Minister’s reply suggests to me either that he and his colleagues have not thought the matter through, or that they have done so and are reluctant to engage with the real consequences, which are not hard to imagine. For example, one can envisage a popular campaign in the press, perhaps in favour of admitting an injured child as No. 20,001. One can imagine a campaign in favour of admitting siblings or other relatives of people already admitted, or, as the hon. Member for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) said, at the end of five years and the current terms of the VRP scheme, a campaign not to send a young person who has thoroughly adopted a British identity back to a strife-ridden country. One can imagine the problems that will arise with that artificial cut-off. I was glad to hear that the Prime Minister is looking at this matter because it is serious and needs considering.

This is easy for me to say, but I would not have started from this point. As many hon. Members have said, one root cause of our current predicament is the Government’s reluctance to engage earlier with the UNHRC Syrian resettlement scheme, which led to the setting up of the VPR scheme in the first place. Therefore, there are some causes that we can discern, and there are ways forward.

Briefly, let me mention a couple of points from my own party’s policy on this matter. We wish to see a Welsh migration service set up to co-ordinate migration into Wales and Wales recognised as a country of refuge.

Finally, I have a question for the Minister on the response of the Welsh Government. I hope that I will not be seen as partisan in this matter. On Monday, the hon. Member for Dundee West (Chris Law) asked the Prime Minister about the response of the Scottish Government. The Prime Minister said that

“in the letter the First Minister of Scotland wrote to me, she said that Scotland would be willing to take 1,000 refugees.”—[Official Report, 7 September 2015; Vol. 599, c. 57.]

That is very praiseworthy indeed, and we have heard that that is a starting point and not an end point. When the Minister winds up, will he tell me—or perhaps put it in a letter—whether he has had a similar offer from the Welsh Government?