Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Darren Jones Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 16th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I declare an interest as a member of Unite the union.

May I start by correcting the public record? As always, I am grateful to Ministers for taking the time to speak with me directly about Bills in my capacity as Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee. Unfortunately, in a Westminster Hall debate on Thursday, the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake), referenced our discussion without giving me advance notice. He said that I was

“very supportive of a minimum service level”.—[Official Report, 12 January 2023; Vol. 725, c. 372WH.]

Let me be very clear to the House, to the Minister and to my constituents: I am against the Bill and will vote against it this evening. What I said to the Minister was that I—and, I am sure, many people—think it reasonable for there to be a minimum level of service from our emergency services during a period of strike action, and I encouraged him to pursue that via discussion with the relevant services and trade unions, not by threatening them with the prospect of an effective statutory ban on their right to strike.

When I asked the Minister whether he had sought to achieve that before introducing the legislation, he was unable to fully answer my question. As we have already heard this evening, the rationale for the Bill is therefore in question. The Government say that the legislation in place is not effective and that voluntary agreements cannot be sought, but that is not correct. Indeed, in signing off the Transport Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill and its compliance with the European convention on human rights, even the Government said:

“In the case of other key public services, important factors exist to mitigate the impacts of industrial action”.

So what has changed?

As we have already heard, section 240 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 makes it a criminal offence and a breach of employment contract to strike if doing so puts someone’s life in danger or puts them at risk of serious injury. That is why we have statutory guidance in place across public services, and it is why trade unions put life-and-limb service provision in place when they organise strikes with management.

On voluntary agreements, in December last year and this month, such agreements have been put in place. Unison and GMB told me that they limited strike action to six or 12 hours instead of 24 hours, that there were procedures for bringing workers back from the picket line if they were needed on the ward, and that they monitored call volumes in real time to ensure that patients were kept safe. As far as I am aware—from speaking with striking nurses at Southmead Hospital in my constituency, and later with senior management—there were no problems with those voluntary service arrangements, so the law is in place, voluntary agreements are in place, and there is no rationale for the Bill. We can therefore only conclude that it is a negotiating tactic—a threat—by the Government.

Lastly, my Committee was disappointed by the lack of time for scrutinising the Bill. Once again, Ministers have introduced primary legislation with wide-ranging discretionary powers for Ministers without publishing the details of vital secondary legislation in a timely manner. That is unacceptable. It is poor practice for Ministers to bring legislation to the House in that way. As the Regulatory Policy Committee confirmed for me today, the Government are obliged to publish an impact assessment so that that Committee can inform the House of the impact of legislation proposed by Ministers. However, Ministers have not given the Regulatory Policy Committee the time to review the Government’s impact assessment and then inform the House about the consequences of the legislation.

So not only do we have a Bill that has no evidence-based rationale for the need to legislate on voluntary agreements, but we have a Government rushing through the legislation without following due process and without drafting it to the standard that this House requires. It is clearly a rushed threat, it is unacceptable and it shows disregard for the House and the job that we have to do as parliamentarians to ensure that the law is passed effectively.

To summarise, can the Minister confirm that the Government will publish the statutory instruments and the impact assessment before the Bill finishes its passage through this House? I politely suggest that he may want to have another go at trying to explain to the House why the Bill is even necessary in the first place.