Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, I have three reasons for wishing to speak in this debate. First, I am a former member and acting chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life. The noble Viscount, Lord Younger of Leckie, and the noble Lord, Lord Lang of Monkton, referred to the work of that committee, which spent considerable amounts of time looking at the well-being issue. There is no doubt of the importance of that area. I remember chairing a meeting in which a number of professional associations connected with lobbying were proposing a voluntary code of conduct. The real problem is to identify what constitutes lobbying or a lobbying group. During the meeting it became clear that those who abused the process would never volunteer to sign up. We were talking to the good guys. I do not underestimate the problems that the Government have in establishing clear criteria and an effective registration system: it is not easy. However, this Bill will not stop the big players or catch the bad players. It needs a major rewrite and a cross-party approach.

My second reason for speaking is as a former chair of ACAS. The certification office, which is referred to in Part 3 and has not had very much attention up to now, was part of the ACAS family. I know the excellent work that it does and I regretted that it was listed in the bonfire of the quangos. Was that only one or was it two years ago? I fully accept that it was a merger of two tiny organisations with the loss of one photocopier and that it was done for PR reasons so that the Government could claim that they were cutting red tape. The certification officer was and is required to submit an annual report to the chair of ACAS and to the Secretary of State at BIS. Just as I received them when I was chair, the new chair of ACAS will similarly receive those reports. I wish Sir Brendan Barber a very successful tenure as the new chair of ACAS.

Having claimed to scale down the certification office, the Government are now going to increase its role substantially. I understand that Ministers are setting aside £160,000 for this, so at least they recognise the increase in administration. Whatever the Government decide to require of the certification office, I am confident that it will deal with it in its usual competent way. However, I have to ask for an assurance from the Minister on a number of points. Nothing in the Bill will give the certification officer extra powers to stop industrial action or to issue injunctions. I am assuming that this will continue to be dealt with by the courts and is not an extra role for the certification office. I want a categorical assurance that trade union members in sensitive occupations such as prison officers will not be at risk of their home addresses being exposed, particularly those prison officers who work in Northern Ireland.

I also want an assurance that it is not the Government’s intention to politicise the post of certification officer. It enjoys a good deal of trust and confidence, which, once lost, would be difficult to regain. I remind the House that the certification office registers employers’ associations as well. It does not have a political fund, just like the majority of trade unions do not have a political fund. Political funds are clearly the focus of this Government’s attention. For example, if you are an employer in the nuclear power industry and you succeed in having a full-time secondment to BIS, as has happened and probably will continue to happen, who needs a political fund? In fact, who needs to lobby at all?

It is not my intention to spend time on the legal aspects of Part 2. Others are far better qualified than me to cover this. However, the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, as has been said, in its comments on the Bill has said that it is “seriously flawed”. It calls for the Bill’s withdrawal and for a special committee to be charged with improving the Bill within six months,

“because it is in all our interests … to produce an Act that works”.

I certainly support that recommendation.

I am also grateful to Citizens UK for its briefing on Part 2. It is a civil society organisation bringing together faith groups, community and educational institutions, trade unions and other membership-based organisations to campaign on issues such as social care, the living wage, street safety or the civil status of immigrants. It seeks to achieve change by dialogue and consensus, rather than by confrontation. Citizens UK has written that,

“the Bill represents a severe curtailment of democracy and the right to campaign”.

If peaceful, official organisations are silenced in the year running up to elections, that may well lead to a spate of spontaneous or unorganised activity, to which the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, has already referred. That could be highly effective but possibly unsafe.

If Part 2 were to prevent the National Union of Students, for instance, and individual student unions from campaigning on higher education fees, what is to stop individual students from driving around university towns with a large van with a screen on top showing a DVD on a continuous loop of Nick Clegg saying, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m very, very, very sorry” for the change of policy on fees? We may see some interesting initiatives.

My third and final reason for contributing is as a former president of NALGO, now UNISON, and a former president of the TUC. I was a lay activist and not a full-time official. I was in a trade union which did not affiliate to the Labour Party or have a political fund. It was only when NALGO was prevented by the courts from campaigning for public services that we decided we should have a political fund. The vote in favour was overwhelming. The general political fund, as it was called, gave money to various causes and political parties and groupings, and continues to do so. It produces an annual report which is summarised in the union journal so that 1.3 million members can read it.

Only when the merger between NALGO, NUPE and COHSE took place did we have to come up with a solution about party political affiliation as the other two unions were affiliated to the Labour Party. The solution was elegant. Members could choose to join the general political fund, the Labour Party affiliated fund, both funds or neither. There were four choices. If noble Lords will excuse the pun, I am labouring this point because every union has a varied history and traditions. Some 166 unions send returns to the certification officer and only 15 unions are affiliated to the Labour Party. Part 3 will affect all those unions if they have more than 10,000 members. Those with below 10,000 members constitute a mere 2.7% of the total. This fishing net—fishing was referred to earlier—has such a small gauge it would probably be banned by the EU.

The Minister in the House of Commons acknowledged that maintaining an accurate register of members is already difficult. Workers move from building site to building site—that is, if they have not been blacklisted by some hidden lobby group. Workers drive around the country or their town. They do shifts and hot-desking. They are volunteers and they do a substantial amount of the work in their union. Adding to their burden could be seen as anti-trade union. The Government should be very careful not to focus all their attention on a few trade union full-time officials. The effect on lay members will be the test. It will not undermine confidence in the union. It will be seen as part of the package of pay freezes, changes in pensions and loss of job security.

In many cases, employees and their trade union rely on the employer for up-to-date membership lists. Apart from giving more work to the employer, the proposed legislation could see a situation where the employer provides a list and then complains to the certification officer about its accuracy. Part 3 is an unnecessary and irritating diversion from the real issue of lobbying, which is where the power really lies and who abuses that power.