Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Debate between Angela Rayner and John McDonnell

Committee stage
Monday 30th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. Her point links to what I was trying to express earlier: the Government fail to recognise that every time they suggest in some way that our paramedics, nurses and other key workers do not provide a minimum service and do not take seriously the impact of challenging in the way they have been forced to. They protect the very people they are there to support. The Government have misjudged how people feel about that, because not only have they caused offence to those workers who protect us day in, day out, but they have failed to recognise that every single one of our key workers who does that has friends and family who know that they do that. This is why the public get very upset with the Government when they suggest that somehow our paramedics, nurses and other key workers do not provide those standards. I agree with my hon. Friend: if the Government were able to get out more and see what happens on the ground, they would have a clearer understanding of why this legislation will not work and fix the problems. The public understand that and the Minister should take note.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

If we walk through this legislation and its eventual implementation, we see that it will result in either a worker being sacked or a worker being sacked and a trade union being fined. Can my right hon. Friend think of anything that could greater exacerbate the current industrial-relations climate than those sorts of threats?

[Angela Rayner]

I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend. That is exactly what this Government are walking into and I think it will exacerbate the situation. The Government have been exacerbating the situation not just by bringing forward this legislation—most of the public can see what they are trying to do—but through the tone with which they have carried out, or failed to carry out, negotiations to avert the industrial action we have seen. Nurses are taking industrial action for the first time ever. Rather than get round the table and sort the mess out that they have created after 13 years in government, the Government try to demonise those very workers. The public do not thank them for that.

EU Membership: Economic Benefits

Debate between Angela Rayner and John McDonnell

Wednesday 15th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

I will come on to that subsequently.

With regard to trade, the EU is Britain’s largest export market by a long way. Some 44% of UK exports go to the EU, worth £223 billion. That is more than double the value of exports to the US, and more than 10 times the value of exports to China. That just gives an idea of the scale of the impact of the EU on our economy. It is argued that withdrawal from the EU will have no implications for jobs, investment and trade, almost as though things will just carry on as before. That flies in the face of experience of all other trade relationships. Access to the single market would have to be renegotiated. That would take at least two years, and more likely the seven to 10 years predicted by others. The climate of uncertainty created would undermine the critical factors investors and decision makers require when they invest for the long term: certainty, security and stability.

We have seen only this morning in Rolls-Royce the latest example of a company expressing its doubts about its long-term investment plans if Brexit goes ahead. We have also seen competitors across Europe welcoming with open arms those companies considering relocation if the decision goes to Brexit.

[Angela Rayner (Ashton-under-Lyne) (Lab)]

In my constituency people on the doorsteps are talking to me about two things: the economy and immigration. Does my hon. Friend agree that leaving Europe would affect only one of those things—our economy, which will be negatively affected? Leaving will do nothing around immigration.

[John McDonnell]

I will come on to that later in my speech, but the evidence is clear: the impact on our economy overall will set us back a number of years. Brexit will undermine our economy and undermine the futures of our families and communities, while at the same time doing nothing with regard to migration overall.