Blacklisting

Debate between Chris Heaton-Harris and Baroness Jowell

Wednesday 23rd January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dame Tessa Jowell (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I welcome this debate and the “open door” tone of the Secretary of State’s approach, and I hope that we can build on that and reach a practical conclusion. The debate gives the House the opportunity to unite in condemning blacklisting as an assault on the legitimate rights of trade unionists. My second reason for welcoming the debate is that I want to underline the extent to which excellent partnership between trade unions and contractors is essential to achieving the progress in big infrastructure projects, particularly when building on the success of the construction programme in the Olympic park.

I will dwell only briefly on the analogy with phone hacking. It appears that in certain parts of the industry, phone hacking became insidious, endemic and culturally tolerated. The question that the Opposition are testing is the extent to which a similar acquiescence prevails in the construction industry today, even in the context of the very best intentions.

I should like to focus specifically on the construction of the Olympic park. To provide context, I should say that the work of the trade unions was the hallmark of the success of the Olympic park development. In that context, the allegations revealed by the widely praised and thorough investigation by the Scottish Affairs Committee come as a surprise and cause great alarm. Had it not been for the persistence and determination of the Committee, we would not be having this debate.

As we embarked on the construction of the Olympic park, there was a determination by the then Government that every public pound should work harder for a social purpose. A number of months were spent negotiating principles of co-operation with the trade unions. The signatories to those principles were the Government, the Olympic Delivery Authority, the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, and the Mayor of London. The essence of the principles is captured in their pledge:

“The procurement processes will require contractors to uphold employment law and encourage them to promote effective industrial relations dialogue between employers and recognised unions, apply industry agreements, and to encourage a positive role for recognised unions in the workplace.”

I argue that those commitments set a blueprint for good industrial practice. They reaped great benefits for the country and for the regeneration of the Olympic park.

However, so insidious is the practice of blacklisting that, as has been mentioned, one of the contractors, Balfour Beatty, felt that it was okay and acceptable to check the database of the Consulting Association in relation to 12 employees. The fact that all 12 went on to get employment is not the point; the point is that Balfour Beatty felt that it was okay to use the practice of blacklisting to check the people out. That is completely antipathetic to the whole ethos of the development, in partnership with the trade unions, of the Olympic park.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I understand what the right hon. Lady said about the negotiations beforehand that took so long to get to this point and yet still blacklisting happened. Knowing what she does now, and having been involved in those negotiations in the past, what does she believe to be the lessons we can learn so that what happened cannot happen in future?

[Dame Tessa Jowell]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. I refer again to the Secretary of State’s reaction to this debate, which is to say, “Give me the evidence”, and that is perfectly fair. However, right hon. and hon. Members on the Labour Benches, and no doubt Members in all parts of the House, sense that this reprehensible practice has not been squeezed out of the construction industry altogether. This is an opportunity for the House to come together and set the scale of its resolve to end this practice and, in so doing, create a sense of liberation for many trade unionists who feel that it is always a threat sitting on their shoulder. That is why we are asking for this action. Specifically, we are looking at all the legal obstacles and impediments to bringing forward the necessary action and sanctions when construction firms fall short and resort to this practice, in whatever way.

The Olympic Delivery Authority had a senior trade unionist on its board as a way of facilitating easy access to the trade unions in voicing their concerns. I thank Barry Camfield, who was a senior official of the then Transport and General Workers Union, for the service that he gave. Many other progressive initiatives supported the central objective of partnership in the development of the Olympic park, including the establishment of a community and trade union learning centre that had a permanent presence in the park and gave hundreds of learners who were working there the opportunity to improve their English and maths skills and to master basic IT, and the promotion of opportunities for women and disabled people to find a place in the construction industry. The bigger mission was to change the face of the construction industry from being predominantly older and male to something much more diverse and much more open to the range of available skills, and there were huge achievements.

There was an emphasis on health and safety at the Olympic park. As we have heard, sometimes the fact that a trade unionist was very vigilant about reporting health and safety matters could be cause for discrimination against them. At the Olympic park, health and safety was given pre-eminence to such a level of achievement that the ODA was awarded a Diamond Jubilee award by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. It is unprecedented for a construction project of that size, scale and complexity to be completed without a single serious reported accident or a single death. That is what we get through partnership with the trade unions.