Zero-hours Contracts Debate

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Baroness Hollis of Heigham

Main Page: Baroness Hollis of Heigham (Labour - Life peer)

Zero-hours Contracts

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts
Thursday 11th June 2015

(9 years, 5 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Baroness Hollis of Heigham Portrait Baroness Hollis of Heigham (Lab)
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My Lords, most people on zero-hours contracts are also in minimum-wage jobs. They are very low paid. In the past 48 hours, we have learned that the Government are expecting something like £5 billion out of the £12 billion welfare cuts to be saved from working tax credits. Those people on zero-hours contracts survive because of those tax credits. How will they survive in future?

Baroness Neville-Rolfe Portrait Baroness Neville-Rolfe
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My Lords, zero-hours contracts allow people to come into the workforce who could not otherwise come in for the reasons I have explained, participate and get a job. The social security welfare framework continues to apply. This seems to me to be a good thing, not a bad thing, as the noble Baroness suggests.