Nuclear Power Funding

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

I would love it if my hon. Friend were here, Mr Sharma, but sadly he is in his constituency. I am sure Hansard will correct the record shortly.

[Mr Virendra Sharma (in the Chair)]

My apologies.

[Gavin Newlands]

That is okay, I am used to it—although my hon. Friend has a ginger beard, so I am not sure what that says. I congratulate the hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Virginia Crosbie)—I will try to pronounce her constituency correctly—on securing today’s debate. It is an issue, to be honest, that deserves a better turnout than we have today, although she said there was a poor turnout for the Bill last week, so it is probably no surprise that a Westminster Hall debate on the same issue will not generate a large crowd either.

She said it was one minute to midnight, which we have heard a number of times from different politicians over the past few weeks, particularly at COP26, and she is right about that. As a Scot and SNP Member of Parliament, that makes me wonder why the Government continually put up barriers to Scotland’s renewable industry, not least by not getting involved in the grid connection charges, as Scotland has the highest in Europe.

Had I known that there would not be many Members here today, I might have prepared a longer speech. I will certainly leave plenty of time for the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead). The hon. Member for Ynys Môn spoke about the elephant in the room. With this Government, it is the mammoth in the room, such is the old-school thinking on this country’s future energy needs, and the fact the Government are utterly blinkered on the issue of nuclear. Nuclear industry lobbying has convinced them that nuclear is not only desirable but essential for the future. That is simply not the case.

Hinkley Point C is the most expensive power station in the world. The Government’s rationale was that building a suite of large-scale nuclear power stations would lead to competition and cheaper costs. However, the piecemeal approach of nominally awarding sites to different preferred bidders meant that EDF was the only game in town. There was no competition whatsoever when negotiating the contracts. EDF had been beset with problems with prototype stations in Finland and France, so it had to be a bit more cautious in its pricing. It is no surprise to anyone that the UK Government had to sign such a bad deal. The extraordinary strike rate of £92.20 per megawatt-hour for a 35-year contract, compared with the cost of offshore wind at £40 per megawatt-hour, for just a 15-year concession, meant that Hinkley C was not just a bad deal, it was economically illiterate.

In the Budget, the Chancellor committed £1.7 billion to progress Sizewell for a final investment decision. That was in addition to the £500 million earmarked for the development of nuclear. As I said, the Government’s previously stated position was that building a suite of new large-scale nuclear power stations would lead to competition and cheaper costs. If they are using the same design as Hinkley, and a second station is easier and cheaper, as they have told us time and again, why do the Government need to commit a further £1.7 billion up front for outline design and costings? I am sure the Minister will answer that in his summing up.

Let us remember that that is essentially £1.7 billion just to make a final decision on its construction or otherwise. The truth is that not only is nuclear hideously expensive now and for the 35 years following construction, it will be horrendously expensive for hundreds of years to come. It will cost £132 billion just to deal with the existing nuclear waste legacy. Tories are usually keen on dealing with issues now and not leaving them for future generations to deal with. That is the excuse they give us when they freeze public sector pay or remove the £20 universal credit uplift. Why do they want to create another costly, needless and dangerous waste legacy for future generations to deal with?

The Minister rather let the cat out of the bag by essentially admitting in a recent letter that accompanied the Bill that the Government were introducing an alternative funding model that might save the taxpayer between £30 billion and £80 billion, and that the Hinkley Point C project was very poor value for money. I am certainly not going to argue with that. That being the case, how much money does the Minister estimate has been wasted on Hinkley? Crucially, how many billions of pounds are the Government willing to commit bill payers to, and what are all the future costs locked into nuclear power? If they say that they can save up to £80 billion, there would surely have to be a commitment of hundreds of billions of pounds.

The hon. Member for Ynys Môn alluded to the announcement made yesterday that Rolls-Royce has essentially match-funded the £210 million from the UK Government to develop small modular reactors. Initially, the hope is to have five SMRs at an estimated £2 billion a pop. We all know what happens with estimates in the nuclear industry, but that is another £10 billion that will likely end up on our energy bills in capital cost alone.

What else could we do with that amount of money? For starters, as the Minister has heard many times from my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown), Scotland is crystal clear. We do not want any new nuclear power stations. A YouGov poll showed that only 30% of Scots want nuclear to have a major role. The experts are clear that we do not need nuclear energy to decarbonise. In the 2019 world nuclear industry status report, Mycle Schneider, who was the lead officer of the report, said that nuclear power

“meets no technical or operational need that these low-carbon competitors cannot meet better, cheaper, and faster.”

The previous chief executive of National Grid, Steve Holliday, said that the idea of large power stations for baseload was “outdated”. He went on to say:

“From a consumer’s point of view, the solar on the rooftop is going to be the baseload.”

We could upgrade our homes to energy performance certificate band C. We could have wave and tidal generation, in which Scotland currently leads the world. This is a position that will be under threat unless this Government can find a fraction of the money that they are committing to new nuclear to help scale this up. There needs to be much greater investment in carbon capture and storage. The Government really must reverse their disgraceful decision not to select the Acorn Project cluster bid at St Fergus—the stand-out project—as one of the track-1 CCS projects. If the Tories were serious about decarbonisation, they would have approved the St Fergus carbon capture, utilisation and storage site, instead of the lesser pork-barrel options in the red wall.

There is a false argument, made by many in this place, that nuclear is required for when the sun does not shine and the wind does not blow. Pumped storage hydro, a renewable energy source that utilises surplus grid energy to fill the reservoirs and dispatch electricity when required, is cheaper, greener and more efficient. Pumped storage hydro is the perfect complement for intermittent renewables. An Imperial College London report suggested that there could be a system saving of £700 million a year from using pumped storage hydro instead of nuclear. Why should Scottish bill payers be forced to pay for nuclear energy that they do not want or need? This is another democratic deficit for Scotland, especially when so much of our renewable energy is not being supported at the moment and we are stuck with the highest grid charges in Europe.

To conclude, Scotland is very poorly served by UK Government energy policy. It is crystal clear that we need to control our own energy decisions through independence; that day will be coming a lot sooner than the Members in this room think.

[Mr Virendra Sharma (in the Chair)]

I want to apologise for getting mixed up with the names.

[Gavin Newlands]

That’s okay—my own wife gets it wrong.

Employment and Trade Union Rights (Dismissal and Re-engagement) Bill

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Friday 22nd October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Laura Farris]

We all know there is always a risk that we make employment relations so onerous that there is a temptation to engage consultants. What we are primarily looking at is employers that have larger, unionised workforces. I am not sure how many employers it would engage, but the short point is that Conservative Members want a solution that does not make an existing problem worse, drive redundancies or lead to more business failures. Fire and rehire must be a genuine option of last resort when a negotiated settlement cannot be reached, when the business is on the brink of insolvency and when the alternative is layoffs.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for the conversations we had when I proposed legislation on this issue last year. She says that, had fire and rehire been banned, British Airways might have just made people redundant, and she cites the example of pilots. This has happened already, and Ryanair negotiated temporary changes. Why would British Airways not have done the same, had it not been allowed to fire and rehire?

[Laura Farris]

I will return to that point when I address British Airways in a bit more detail.

As I have said to the Minister, we need more than ACAS guidance. I want to see the rules on dismissal and re-engagement set out in an ACAS code of practice, with financial sanctions to back them up. Parliament specifically envisaged the possibility of doing this when it passed the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. Section 207 gives the Secretary of State the power to introduce a code of practice in respect of anything in that Act. Parliament also considered and welcomed the possibility that the Secretary of State would have the power to impose legal teeth. Section 207A addresses the possibility that any compensation can be increased by up to 25% if the employer does not comply with an ACAS code of practice.

We know that ACAS codes of practice can be effective. The hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) is an employment lawyer and will know that when we think about, for example, the ACAS codes of practice on disciplinaries or grievance procedures, it is vanishingly rare to get into an employment tribunal nowadays and find that the employer was oblivious to those codes of practice. Why do employers know about them? Because there is risk—financial risk. If they go down in the employment tribunal, there could be an uplift on compensation, and they want to avoid that, so we know that it is has the right effect.

What should the code of practice say? We have some of the answers already. The BEIS call for evidence, which was published through ACAS, gives us some clues. I think practitioners made such suggestions very well, including, in relation to paragraph 56 of that report, that employers should provide an analysis of whether changes are anticipated to last for more or less than five years with evidence to substantiate that answer, and, in relation to paragraph 76, that they should provide evidence of reasonable alternatives they have explored and evidence of their financial position.

Another point comes out of the excellent work of the Transport Committee, and I want to pay tribute to the very impressive session it had with Willie Walsh on 11 May 2020. Anyone who has read the transcript will recall that he was asked repeatedly by the Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), whether, if British Airways returned to full profitability, he would restore workers’ wages to their previous levels, and he declined to confirm that he would do so. That created huge exposure for British Airways, and I do not think it is any surprise that, when Alex Cruz appeared before the Select Committee six months later, he gave a rather different explanation.

BEIS would then have the opportunity to require employers to set the criteria that they would exercise in deciding when to restore workers’ pay. I think it would enable the Government to give guidance on this distinct category of dismissals, how they should be treated and what the employment tribunal should be looking for. My final point on this is that it would give the Government real teeth, and it would incentivise employers to do the right thing and give employees more power to enforce their existing rights.

The point has been made, but most of the employers we have cited in this House are considering fire and rehire in relation to large proportions of their workforce. With British Airways, 12,000 people were at risk. If every single one of those people could get an uplift in a compensatory award of 10% to 25%, then—let us be realistic—that might be £10,000 or £20,000 times 12,000. That creates a huge incentive for the employer to do the right thing, because there will be a very significant financial penalty if they fail. That will mean that consultations are entered into with legal advice, which is a good thing, as well as with an open mind and an open spirit.

By the way, consultation is not a meaningless word, as all hon. Members will know. When it is approached in the right spirit, it can often lead to alternatives to the thing that is most feared by the employee. That is the suggestion that I have made to Ministers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

I am pleased to support, indeed to sponsor, the Bill of the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), and I am delighted that we are finally getting the chance properly to debate and vote on the merits of fire and rehire legislation. As hon. Members may be aware, I introduced two Bills on this subject in the last parliamentary Session, before the hon. Gentleman was wise enough to use his high private Member’s Bill raffle slot for this issue. I am grateful to him for seeking me out earlier to discuss my experiences. My Bills were sponsored by Members from every party in the House. Conservative Members have been talking about cross-party work, and with my Bills every party in the House that existed at the time was represented. An additional Scottish splinter party has since been formed, but that is neither here nor there.

I also engaged with the trade unions from the outset. Indeed, I invited Howard Beckett of Unite to lend his expertise on the issue at my first meeting with the Minister, and I am grateful to Hazel Nolan and Gary Smith of GMB for their support throughout that period.

My Bills were more straightforward than this Bill, in that they essentially did bin fire and rehire. I thought it important to put that at the heart of what was a presentation Bill. However, I said to the Minister, the hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris) and many others to whom I spoke that I would work with the Minister and others to progress a Bill to allow protections that might not end fire and rehire, such as the Bill we are debating today.

I mentioned the hon. Member for Newbury. I listened carefully to her speech, and I think most of us agree that she made some excellent points, but it struck me that the vast majority of the speech could and should have been made in Committee. She agreed with the principles of what the Bill seeks to do, and I therefore hoped and expected that she would support it.

[Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con)]

In fact, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury was suggesting that we did not need legislation for this. That is why she said that she was opposing the Bill.

[Gavin Newlands]

I fundamentally disagree—[Interruption.] It would be useful if the hon. Lady would allow me to finish my response to her intervention.

In fairness, most of the speech made by the hon. Member for Newbury was not setting out that view; that is certainly not how it came across at the time. I appreciate that that is the conclusion that the hon. Member for Newbury reached, but she could have worked with the hon. Member for Brent North and others across the House to help with legislation that would appease all of us, and the workers of this country.

Ministers, however, have done what they have done every time fire and rehire has been raised with them: they have clucked sympathetically, wrung their hands at how horribly ungentlemanly these companies are being, and said how much they sympathise with the workers who are being blackmailed, and have then proceeded to do absolutely nothing to address this in legislation. Every Minister from the Prime Minister down seems to have forgotten that it is the Government who speak from the Dispatch Box, and that they have the power to act to protect workers rather than murmuring sympathy for the benefit of Hansard and no one else.

The Government should understand that this issue is not going to go away. It will certainly not go away as a result of guidelines. My Bills failed to make progress; the hon. Member for Brent North is having another crack. Until and unless the law is changed to protect workers, this issue will come back to haunt the Government time and again.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

Was my hon. Friend as surprised as I was that the Government did not propose an employment Bill in the Queen’s Speech, telling the media that it was not a priority at that time?

[Gavin Newlands]

The short answer to my hon. Friend is no, I was not surprised that the Government failed to propose such a Bill. That was to be expected from the Conservatives.

Unless and until the Government act to close this loophole and ensure that workers are protected from the likes of Tesco, British Gas and British Airways and their bully-boy tactics, the need to change the law will continue to be raised, at least from these Benches. The case of British Airways is a perfect demonstration of how UK workers’ rights are light years behind those in much of Europe. Its parent company, IAG, also owns Aer Lingus and Iberia. While BA was telling its UK staff to take cuts in pay and conditions last year, workers in Ireland and Spain were protected from the same tactics because their Governments over the years have ensured that employees are entitled to a level of protection in law from their bosses. Willie Walsh—who has already been mentioned today—and the IAG management knew that they could hit workers in the UK hardest and fastest, because this Government allow them to do so.

[Ruth Cadbury]

The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent point. As he says, fire and rehire is illegal in countries such as Ireland and Spain because it is in primary legislation. Does he agree, therefore, that the option proposed by Conservative Members—the introduction of an ACAS code of conduct to deal with the issue—is entirely insufficient?

[Gavin Newlands]

I could not agree more with my Transport Committee colleague. This has to be in primary legislation and that is what people on the Opposition Benches will continue to work for if the Government vote the Bill down today.

Many people across the country think—perhaps unfairly at times, but not so in my experience—that the Tories can be uncaring on these issues, because they do not see the poverty and the pain of not being able to provide for one’s family. [Interruption.] That is just not the case. I spoke to a number of British Airways employees who broke down in tears telling me of the fact that the airline they had served, in many cases for decades, was looking to give them what amounted to a pay cut of 50% or more, and that they had told their Conservative MP all about it, who did nothing. Nothing. Surely, we are here to represent our constituents, particularly in their time of need. If not, what exactly are we here to do?

[Christine Jardine]

Like me, the hon. Gentleman represents one of Scotland’s major airports. I had the same representations from very many staff who live in my constituency of Edinburgh West and work for British Airways at Edinburgh Airport. That was very much the feeling that came across. Does he agree with me that they were disappointed and felt that they had been there for so long that there was a moral obligation to offer them better than what they were getting from British Airways, and that there is a moral obligation on us, as Members of Parliament, to support that?

[Gavin Newlands]

Absolutely. I thank the hon. Member for her intervention. I agree with her 100%. I find myself in agreement with her far too many times these days. She is absolutely right: our moral obligation, as Members of Parliament, is to support our constituents when they are under attack in such a way.

[Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gavin Newlands]

I will move on. I will come back to the hon. Gentleman. [Interruption.] Or not, if he is going to huff. It is up to him.

I do not believe that it is any coincidence that those countries with heftier employment rights around Europe have better and more robust economies. We can see the results of precarious employment around society right now: labour shortages in all sorts of sectors of the economy and lacklustre demand experienced by retailers. If our economy is 80% centred on the service sector, we need people spending money on those services. Leaving workers with the fear that tomorrow could see their employer slash their wages or show them the door is a sure-fire way to depress spending, demand, and ultimately hinder economic recovery. Workers in Europe have no such fears, and it is surely a factor in their continued long-term outstripping of the UK that employment rights are given such importance and credence by their national Governments.

Whatever ideological objections some Members on the Tory Benches have to improving workers’ rights—I have no doubt a few of them consider the factory Acts a gross impertinence—they can surely see the economic self-interest that protecting workers from fire and rehire would mean for employer, employee, and our society and economy as a whole. It is no wonder Ministers want to isolate the UK further and further from Europe; they want the UK isolated from the norms of employment rights that apply there. They want workers in the UK isolated from the economic benefits that enhanced rights would bring. They want the UK isolated from the basic standards of decency that apply across the continent. On decency, I will give way.

[Alexander Stafford]

Is not one of the big differences between what we are doing in the UK and what they do on the continent, that on the continent they have mass immigration across the EU, which is driving down wages, whereas in this country, now that we have left the EU, we can look after workers better, not rely on poorly paid labourers and actually get high quality high-skilled jobs? That is the fundamental difference: we want better jobs and better pay for people, rather than relying on cheap labour.

[Gavin Newlands]

Well, I find that rather astonishing. The hon. Gentleman talks about improving workers’ lot, yet they are voting down this legislation today. The lack of self-awareness in some Conservative Members is astonishing. They are very fond of talking about levelling up, but not, mysteriously, when it comes to levelling up workers’ rights against the power wielded by multibillion pound corporations and their multimillionaire managers. The idea that the UK should level up to European standards is anathema to them.

I am coming to my conclusion as I appreciate that there are many Members who want to speak today, but I would like briefly to take this opportunity to mention my own Devolution (Employment) (Scotland) Bill, which is on the Order Paper today. It is an unlikely contender for Royal Assent, given that it is at the bottom of the Order Paper today, but it is an attempt to prise employment law from the clammy grip of the Treasury Bench as far as Scotland is concerned. Do not worry, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will not speak to it; I mention it only because I fear that the Tories will vote down the Bill before us today. To my mind, that will be the straw that broke the camel’s back. No more should Scottish workers be forced to suffer the consequences of unthinking and uncaring Tory Governments. Dovetailing nicely with that is the fact that the Scottish Government supported my legislation last year and that banning fire and rehire was also in the Scottish National party manifesto for the Scottish elections in May, in which we received our record vote.

If this UK Government continue to stick their head in the sand and depress workers’ rights below the level seen in most other civilised countries, they should not be surprised if Scotland chooses civilisation instead of the race to the bottom that seems to be happening to workers here. Workers across these isles should all be accorded the respect and dignity they deserve, and have that backed up with the force of law where required. I commend the Bill to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Pawsey]

I was in the process of setting out the scenarios identified by ACAS in its paper of June 2021 on where dismissal and reinstatement had been used. The final point, which has been made by Conservative Members in particular, is the challenge of business survival in the current circumstances, with covid, and the need for businesses to get through an incredibly difficult time.

The ACAS paper also identified a number of differing attitudes to the reasonableness of using dismissal and reinstatement in dealing with one of those scenarios. It set out a series of positions, including, at the very top, the view that this should never be used. Before arriving in the Chamber this morning, I believed that that was the attitude of the Member promoting the Bill; I believed that he would never permit dismissal and reinstatement to take place. However, he told us today that in certain circumstances it can exist and that he is seeking not to ban it but to ensure that it is never needed to be used. I am sure that a number of his Opposition colleagues do not agree with that approach and would be in the “never” camp. Others see it as being a matter of concern when it is a negotiation tactic, which I think is a view common on this side of the House. There are those who see it as an option of genuine last resort, a view again sympathetically understood by those on this side. Others think it is not at all contentious—I do not think that anybody here believes that—and there are some who believe it is perfectly acceptable at any time, and the House has made its view clear on that.

I now wish to turn to the issue of Centrica, because the Select Committee on Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy looked at that. We heard in Centrica’s evidence to the Committee that the costs of its services were between 30% and 50% more expensive than the use of contractors. The senior management had real concerns about the viability of their business ongoing. They sought less to deal with the issue of pay, but more to deal with the number of hours on a standard contract. They wanted to increase that from 37 to 40 hours. Indeed, in their restructuring 20% of their staff would receive a pay rise. One thing that the chief executive reminded us of in his evidence was the need for businesses to keep sight of what the customer wants and what their needs are. Those of us who have been in business will know that the customer is king and that those of us who disregard the needs of our customers put their businesses at a significant disadvantage. Where businesses are uncompetitive, it is important to deal with these things at an early stage, because otherwise, as we know, the danger is of long-term redundancies and business failures, which are not in the interests of anybody.

[Gavin Newlands]

I take the hon. Gentleman’s point about business requirements, but would it not be a more productive approach to seek that agreement with the union, rather than holding a metaphorical gun to its head at the start of negotiations?

[Mark Pawsey]

I, and the majority of Conservative Members, are in agreement with the hon. Gentleman. We want those discussions to take place at an earlier stage. Centrica believed that it was a requirement to issue a section 188 notice at an early stage, because redundancies might be necessary. That was a matter of the interpretation of law.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Scully]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The unambiguous message is that using fire and rehire as a bully-boy negotiating tactic is absolutely inappropriate. However, and I will develop this point later, I do not believe that the Bill as it stands—even if it is amended, because we do not believe that we need primary legislation to achieve these ends—will have the intended effect, because it will not ban fire and rehire, as the hon. Member for Brent North said. I think he needs a bigger badge to explain what it actually does do, in his opinion. However, we want to get rid of using fire and rehire as a negotiating tactic, as a bully-boy tactic, and that is what the other measures that we are proposing seek to achieve.

[Gavin Newlands]

The Minister says that we are sending an unambiguous message, yet he refuses to legislate. I am not sure how that is unambiguous, but let me ask him this question: does he intend to talk out the Bill today?

[Paul Scully]

The hon. Member talks about being unambiguous and says that we are refusing to legislate. As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller), legislation that comes from the fact that we are coming to the end of a pandemic is not the right way to reflect the concerns about the long-term issue of workers’ rights. We need to make sure that we can address the situation. We will legislate if we need to, but as a last resort, not a first resort. A fundamental difference between Government and Opposition Members is that Opposition Members immediately look for primary legislation rather than other ways of incentivising employers to do the right thing, with the carrot of incentivisation and the stick of making sure that there are financial penalties and clear downsides for businesses that do the wrong thing.

Net Zero Strategy and Heat and Buildings Strategy

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

I agree with some of the points that the hon. Lady makes about the importance of skills, but I do not think that it is about our delivering the message late. This Government’s commitment to skills and to reskilling if necessary has been absolutely clear. It can be seen right the way across Government in the very close work being done together by BEIS and the Department for Education. I see it in so many sectors. I will mention again my visit to Aberdeen last week. I appreciate that Aberdeen is some distance from her constituency, but the sector there has to be able to reskill a lot of people from offshore oil and gas to offshore wind. It is that kind of thing that we need to see on a transition and a long-term basis. It is exactly this idea of making sure that we can retrain and reclassify people from today’s skills to fit the skills for tomorrow. That is absolutely part of our commitment.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

The Minister talks about ending the sale of petrol and diesel cars by 2030. To do so, we will need drivers to switch to zero-emission vehicles over the next decade. Despite the upfront costs of electric cars still being significantly higher, the financial incentives to switch continue to be diluted. I welcome the shadow Secretary of State’s support for the SNP Scottish Government’s interest-free loan scheme for new and used zero-emission cars, but the Government’s zero-emission vehicle mandate will not even be legislated on until 2024. Nearly half the decade will be behind us when the mandate comes in. Why are the Government moving this policy forward in first gear?

[Greg Hands]

I disagree with the hon. Gentleman. The transport section in the net zero strategy is very comprehensive on this and very extensive on how we get more people to switch to electric vehicles. In terms of some of the details, I invite him to ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport who leads on this at the next Transport questions.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 25th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Amanda Solloway]

The Government are committed to unleashing enterprise and growth across all parts of the United Kingdom, and we will go even further with the publication of our levelling-up White Paper this autumn. The hon. Member will welcome the news that Lancaster and Fleetwood have been awarded funding under the high streets heritage action zones cultural programme. Our £4.8 billion levelling-up fund will invest in infrastructure that improves everyday life across the United Kingdom. We have protected 14 million jobs through the comprehensive package we have put in place. Our plan for jobs is creating, supporting and protecting jobs, and our £2 billion kickstart scheme has helped 16,500 young people to start paid jobs.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

What new support he plans to provide to energy transition projects in Scotland.

[The Minister for Business, Energy and Clean Growth (Anne-Marie Trevelyan)]

This Government are committed to supporting the transition to net zero for all the United Kingdom. Our landmark North sea transition deal will support Scotland’s offshore oil and gas workers, businesses and the supply chain to exploit technologies such as low-carbon hydrogen production and carbon capture usage and storage. In March, we announced £9 million to help Scotland’s world-famous whisky distilleries get into the spirit of going green, cutting emissions and supporting green jobs.

[Gavin Newlands]

I am sure that if we could capture energy and store it, Scotland’s entire energy needs would have been met on Saturday by clean blue energy from St Johnstone fans celebrating their historic cup double. Now that I have shoehorned that in, here is my question. Despite meeting after meeting in which Minister after Minister, including the current Secretary of State, have said that HELMS—Home Energy and Lifestyle Management Systems—customers under the green deal have been, at best, mis-sold products and that it would be fixed, hundreds of my constituents and others right across Scotland and the UK remain swindled by Robert Skillen and his company. I am happy to have another meeting, but I would be even happier with swift and appropriate action.

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and his constituents and to work with officials to make progress.

Vauxhall at Ellesmere Port and Battery Manufacturing Strategy

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Monday 1st March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

My hon. Friend is quite right. The UK Government are absolutely committed not only to the manufacturing of these critically important batteries, but to recycling. We want to see a circular economy for electric vehicles. If we attain that, we will surely maximise the economic and environmental opportunities of the transition to zero emission vehicles.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP) [V]]

We of course welcome ending new petrol and diesel car sales by 2030, but we are dismayed by the absence of a UK Government strategy to support the industry to transition, meaning that this factory’s business model is under threat.

More widely, we have heard great rhetoric from this Government on electric vehicles, but the action is lagging. For example, we have seen nothing from the £3 billion zero emission bus fund, while the Scottish Government power ahead. When will a sustainable strategy be delivered to support factories like Ellesmere Port to not only survive but thrive?

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

We are absolutely committed to that. When I was energy Minister, people like the hon. Member were saying, “When is the energy White Paper going to come out? What is the plan?” We have a 10-point plan, which has been widely accepted and welcomed. We also have an energy White Paper that sets out the path and we are developing strategies for how we get to net zero at a record pace. The Government are delivering. We have a very clear direction, and the industry has broadly welcomed that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 15th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

What recent discussions he has had with the devolved Administrations on the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

What recent discussions he has had with the devolved Administrations on the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Paul Scully)]

The Government have sought to engage constructively with the devolved Administrations throughout the passage of the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill. The recent fruits of that continuing commitment include several amendments tabled by the Government strengthening a role for the devolved Administrations.

[Gavin Newlands]

Of course, Rolls-Royce operates its own internal market in which plant is often set against plant, but more and more it relies on third-party suppliers rather than on in-house manufacture. Inchinnan has already seen some 700 jobs go, and despite favourable production stats, we now know that there will be further redundancies, with the aero shafts line closing and work being transferred to Derby, as well as other UK Rolls-Royce jobs being offshored to Spain. The Scottish Government’s Rolls-Royce working group was set up to protect jobs at Inchinnan. If the Government’s power-grabbing Bill is passed, will the Minister ensure that the Government will work with the Scottish Government to protect Scottish Rolls-Royce jobs?

[Paul Scully]

The hon. Gentleman talks about grabbing powers back, but Scotland will be gaining powers in more than 100 areas that are at the moment controlled by the EU. Of course we will continue to work with important industries such as the aerospace sector and with companies such as Rolls-Royce to protect jobs.

Alternative Fuelled Vehicles: Energy Provision

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 6th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Betts. The last time I spoke on this issue, I cautiously welcomed the Government’s consultation on the acceleration of the phasing out of new petrol and diesel vehicles to 2035, with the important caveat that it still lagged behind the Scottish Government’s target. There has been no confirmation yet of that, but it was progress, as was the doubling of investment in EV charging infrastructure, which was absolutely necessary as England lags considerably behind Scotland in charging points per head of population.

In the year to March this year, ultra-low emission vehicle sales in Scotland grew by 46%—40% faster than in England. That is thanks not only to the better charging network that I have described, but to the more generous support provided by the Scottish Government in the form of interest-free loans to purchase electric plug-in hybrid cars to the value of £35,000, which is over and above the UK Government’s plug-in grant. More than £85 million has been provided by the fund to help to drive the behavioural change that we want to see. We are not yet Norway, where roughly half the cars that are bought are ULEVs. We have a lot more to do, but we are heading in the right direction and taking bold action within the parameters of the fiscal envelope that devolution allows. Perhaps if the UK Government were to show more urgency in this area, we could ramp up our own ambition and help to deliver carbon neutrality even earlier.

Although the cost of electrics are coming down, they can still be prohibitively high for many, particularly for family-sized cars. In the used market, which perhaps is not yet fully mature owing to availability, cost remains high, with no support offered to those who purchase new vehicles—until last Monday. Last week, used ULEVs in Scotland became eligible for an interest-free loan of up to £20,000. That is fantastic news, particularly for those who are priced out of the new market. I am sure that as the availability of used ULEVs improves, the take-up will accelerate. I urge the Minister to convince colleagues to incentivise the purchase of used ULEVs, perhaps by extending the reduced plug-in grant to the used market.

I do not have time to discuss the advances in rail and aviation, although I was pleased to see the ambitious plans outlined by Airbus in the past fortnight, and I am forever hopeful that Rolls-Royce will continue to expand its excellent work in this area, and utilise its expertise and space at its Inchinnan plant in my constituency. However, nearly 400 million bus journeys a year are made in Scotland—four times the number of ScotRail journeys—so getting some of our older, more polluting vehicles off the road, to be replaced by electric or hydrogen buses, is one of the easiest fixes available to us, and that must be accelerated.

The £3 billion bus fund is welcome. We have not seen hide nor hair of it yet, but since then thousands of tonnes of carbon have been emitted, and hundreds of bus manufacturing jobs have gone. To summarise, the Government’s intentions and rhetoric on climate change issues have improved, but our generation and the Government will be judged by their actions, not their slogans.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Amanda Solloway]

I am sure that my hon. Friend did not. We are aware of the wider benefits of flexible working. Nearly half of employees have worked from home during covid-19. Most employees already have the right to request flexible working, which employers can reject only for really sound business reasons. In our manifesto, we committed to take it further, and we will be looking at it in the light of covid.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

What recent discussions he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on increasing support for businesses in Scotland.

[Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)]

What discussions he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on increasing support for businesses in Scotland.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Nadhim Zahawi)]

The Secretary of State and I hold regular discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the issue of business support, including on the schemes available to support Scottish businesses affected by the covid-19 pandemic.

[Gavin Newlands]

We are still waiting on the promised aviation sectoral support. Indeed, far from support, in my Adjournment debate the Minister essentially said that workers should be grateful that Rolls-Royce offered voluntary redundancy. Moreover, the Government have not acted to stop companies such as Menzies Aviation and Centrica following the deplorable fire-and-rehire tactics employed by British Airways, which are now being enforced. Will he tell the House whether he thinks it fair that an employer can force an employer on to reduced terms and conditions or face redundancy? Why is that illegal in so many European countries?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

We are in constant conversation with Rolls-Royce and other employers, quite rightly. The sector will be impacted for between three and five years. It is right that companies should be able to right-size their businesses and, as the Secretary of State referred to, have a constructive dialogue with their employees about how they arrive at that right size. The Government’s position is to support the industry with more than £8.5 billion of support through the covid pandemic.

Rolls-Royce (Redundancies)

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

I thought that we had just had the Adjournment debate, with the last petition from my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson); it has certainly eaten into the time available.

Following its announcement in May of a potential 6,000 job losses around the UK, Rolls-Royce last week proposed what it says is the first tranche. Some 3,000 posts across the UK are under threat, including 700 at the site in Inchinnan in my constituency. Inchinnan is a key site for the company’s maintenance, repair and overhaul—MRO—operations, as well as manufacturing compressors and seals. Such businesses provide parts and support for Rolls-Royce engines used around the world. Their output is world-class, and recognised throughout the business and the industry at large as first-rate. Under the proposals, Rolls-Royce will close the MRO business completely, and the rest of the plant will be downgraded. A total of 700 jobs are threatened, which is over half the total workforce in Inchinnan.

These plans would be a hard blow to the economy in my constituency and across the west of the Scotland. Its impact will also be felt across the supply chain, which goes right across Scotland and the UK. Just yesterday, Wyman-Gordon in Livingston announced 72 redundancies, blaming a drop in orders, including from Rolls-Royce. These are the high-value and highly skilled jobs that we are all fighting to secure for our constituencies—the jobs that Government Ministers promote so often it is almost a cliché. These jobs are the cornerstone of manufacturing in this country and have the potential to grow it further. Yet UK Ministers have been quiet—nay, silent—about what they intend to do to support the workforce and the high-value manufacturing that is so often the subject of press releases and photos of Ministers wearing hard hats.

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman may be aware that the International Air Transport Association does not expect air travel to recover to last year’s levels until 2023. This sustained drop in demand is one reason why companies such as Rolls-Royce are considering large-scale redundancies. He may also be aware that British Airways has threatened to cut 12,000 jobs, citing reduced demand. Many of my constituents who have worked loyally for BA over many years have written to me about the fact that they are now being treated as expendable. I am deeply concerned about that. The hon. Gentleman is making a powerful argument; does he agree that we need an urgent Government intervention to ensure that jobs affected by reduced air travel are protected for the long term?

[Gavin Newlands]

The short answer is absolutely. I completely agree with the proposal that the hon. Lady outlines; in fact, it is a proposal that we have been making to the UK Government for months now. There are many estimates as to how long the industry will take to recover but, as I shall come on to say, there is no denying that the industry will face a long and slow recovery. The industry will face redundancies, but the issue is the nature of some of those redundancies. I shall certainly touch on British Airways a little later, although Rolls-Royce is the focus of my speech.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gavin Newlands]

Before I kick on, it would not be an Adjournment debate without hearing from hon. Gentleman.

[Jim Shannon]

First, I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He brings forward excellent Adjournment debates and makes other excellent contributions in the House, which we all appreciate, and we are pleased to be able to participate.

I absolutely understand where the hon. Gentleman is coming from: just in the past few weeks a major employer in my constituency has outlined how redundancies will be on their way soon. Does he agree that Government support for local industries is essential, as we all know that once a company shuts an operation it never, or rarely, reopens? If we do not hold on to these industries, we will face mass unemployment, alongside the fact that we will be perceived to be a nation that no longer manufacturers or creates, leaving us absolutely at the mercy of imports, which should never be allowed to happen.

[Gavin Newlands]

As usual in these debates, the hon. Gentleman makes a good point. I will outline how Scotland has a very forward-looking approach to manufacturing, particularly in the area in which Rolls-Royce operates, but he is right that when these types of jobs go, they rarely return. I shall elaborate on that later.

When the Minister responds, I hope he will give us a full update on the work that he and his colleagues have undertaken to save the jobs of not only my constituents but those at Rolls-Royce sites right throughout the country. There is no doubt that in the short term there is a period of great challenge—perhaps the greatest ever challenge—for Rolls-Royce and the entire aviation and aerospace sector, but given the history of excellence at Inchinnan, there is also no doubt that as the sector recovers over the coming months and years, there will be a customer base for its output, and Rolls-Royce will benefit from that.

The unions recognise that and want to help. From the start they have set things out clearly to their members and to management and asked how they think the short-term operation of the site can work so that it has a long-term future. Throughout the process, the unions have been pragmatic, serious and forward-thinking, looking for a way forward that supports their members and the company’s operations. Anyone who thinks that the unions at Inchinnan or anywhere else in the Rolls-Royce business are interested in anything other than the long-term future of production at the sites is living in a parallel universe.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Gavin Newlands]

Who do I pick? I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson).

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way; I predict that he will continue to be generous with his time as we all seek to intervene on him.

I appreciate that the focus of this debate is on Rolls-Royce, which is quite appropriate given that my hon. Friend has been leading on this issue as a constituency Member who faces a lot of redundancies in his constituency. I know he will agree with me, because he has done a lot of work on the fact that BA has also announced 12,000 redundancies, added to the 9,000 at Rolls-Royce and the terrible treatment of the workforce at BA. I know that my hon. Friend shares my concern that this is only the tip of the iceberg; is he, like me, hopeful that the Government will intervene? This is the tip of the iceberg and we are going to see tens of thousands more jobs lost across the whole aviation, travel, tourism and aerospace sector. Does he agree that we need urgent Government action right now?

[Gavin Newlands]

I think I was told that I would agree with my hon. Friend, so I do agree with her—I agree completely with what she says. I will come on to discuss British Airways, so if anybody else has an intervention on British Airways, perhaps they should wait until that section of my speech .

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

I thank the hon. Gentleman for allowing me to intervene in this popular Adjournment debate. I congratulate him on making the case for the long-term growth prospects that come from the aerospace sector and Rolls-Royce’s work. Does he agree that time is now of the essence for Ministers? The Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, which I chair, has in recent weeks heard that redundancy decisions are being taken now about tens of thousands of jobs throughout the country. If we look to other countries, such as France, Germany and the United States, which have already brought forward measures to support the industry, we see that the UK is starting to lag behind. We really need to see action sooner rather than later.

[Gavin Newlands]

The hon. Gentleman makes a strong point, and I could not agree with him more. We constantly hear Ministers, particularly from the Department for Transport, talk about things being “under review”, but it has been four months now; we do not have time for further review. We need action, so I totally agree with the hon. Gentleman.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

I am grateful to my friend for giving way. Although he is a friend of mine, I do wish to pay tribute to him for the amount of campaigning work he has done on this issue. A number of constituency Members throughout the country have a situation in which the local economy appears to be collapsing, and my hon. Friend has really led this charge, so I pay tribute to him for that.

I have constituents in Glasgow East who, like my hon. Friend’s constituents, work at the Inchinnan plant and are incredibly concerned about the situation. The Government have shown, whether through things like the furlough scheme or other aspects of how they have handled coronavirus, that they will intervene, and it is right that when they do things right we pay tribute to that. This is a Government who have in the past intervened, stood up and strongly signalled when they needed to see action, so may I say to the Minister and the Government , through my hon. Friend, that on this issue the Government need to speak up and reassure my constituents back home in Glasgow East that they are fighting to try to protect these jobs as much as possible?

[Gavin Newlands]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for those words; I am sure the Minister will address them in his speech.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands) for his tenacity, and not just on Rolls-Royce. With Glasgow airport in his constituency, he has his work cut out for him, but he has certainly risen to the occasion. He will be aware that constituents of mine are also employed in Rolls-Royce in Inchinnan. One of the key concerns I hear from them is that the Rolls-Royce facility is part of the planned National Manufacturing Institute Scotland, which is to develop skills and engineering in the west of Scotland. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is important that the UK Government step in so that we can continue to use the Rolls-Royce facility to develop highly skilled engineering jobs in the west of Scotland?

[Gavin Newlands]

Yes, I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. I will touch on NMIS later in my speech, so I do not want to give too much away now.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Obviously, we must focus on the long term, but there is an immediate and short-term issue. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that some companies seem to have rushed to make decisions on closures when the furlough scheme has been on the go and available for a while now? I have a company in Kilmarnock, Wabtec, which has announced it is closing its plant, ending railway works at the site after more than 100 years. It refuses to consider the furlough scheme, and I do not understand why. It seems to me that Rolls-Royce might be having the same knee-jerk reaction. It could utilise short-term support, then look at the long-term future and see whether it could get long-term Government support.

[Gavin Newlands]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, but I would have preferred it if the Government had not signalled their intention to end the furlough scheme in October, because for many businesses, it will just push redundancies from earlier in the year to later. Perhaps the Government should look at extending it and phasing it out a bit more gradually than they have said. However, the scheme exists and is here until October, and too many businesses are not utilising the scheme to the maximum.

[Antony Higginbotham (Burnley) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way.

[Gavin Newlands]

Yes, although I do not think I have given any of my own speech for a good time.

[Antony Higginbotham]

I welcome the debate the hon. Gentleman has managed to secure. He made a really important point about the impact this decision will have across the UK, not just because of Rolls-Royce’s geographic scope, but because of the whole supply chain that sits behind it. Does he agree that often supply chain businesses are clustered, so the impact will be felt in some communities far more than in others, which is why we need to be particularly mindful of these redundancies?

[Gavin Newlands]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. My constituency has Glasgow airport in it, so as he can imagine, there are many aviation jobs and a strong aerospace sector. We face a pretty tough time in the coming months.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this debate to the House. It is important for my constituents in Anstey, where about a third of the workforce are in danger of losing their jobs. They have recently secured some new repair and overhaul work at the plant, to bring in an additional 30 to 50 jobs, but I understand that some of that work is now going to be offshored and carried out by Rolls-Royce overseas. Does he agree that, at this time, we need to look at how to keep some of that activity here in the UK?

[Gavin Newlands]

I could not agree more, and I will go on to talk about offshoring. I have already made the point that when these jobs go and the work goes overseas to other sites in the Rolls-Royce family, if I can call it that, and to joint venture partners, it is very unlikely to return, so I totally agree with what the hon. Gentleman has just said.

[Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gavin Newlands]

Why not get them all out of the way at the start?

[Zarah Sultana]

I thank the hon. Member for being generous with his time and congratulate him on securing this important debate. Coventry is home to the Rolls-Royce Ansty plant, whose skilled workers will be vital in building the sustainable economic recovery we need following this crisis. Does he agree that the Government must not sit on the sidelines and abandon Rolls-Royce workers, but instead work with the company and the trade unions to protect those jobs and invest in the green technologies of the future?

[Gavin Newlands]

I totally agree that it is not for the Government to sit on the sidelines here. We often hear Governments of all persuasions saying that these things are a matter for private business, but this is a strategic sector of extreme importance to the country. Again, once the jobs go, they will be gone, so the Government have to step in and do something.

We need to be clear that the sacrifices proposed by the workforce and the trade unions go beyond minor flexibilities. They involve real-terms hardship for workers and their families, working for less pay, mothballing sites for months and increasing working hours. These have all been proposed by the union reps at Inchinnan as practical and achievable solutions to the current temporary difficulties. They tell me, however, that these comprehensive offers have been met with complete silence from Rolls-Royce. That is simply unacceptable. Industrial relations should not be conducted as though we were living in the 19th century. The hard-working and loyal workforce must be fully involved in decisions that will change their future and those of their families. My constituents, and those of other Members, who work at Inchinnan should not be treated like chattels or given their jotters whenever the management decides that savings are to be made. As I have said, everyone accepts that there will be change—the unions, the workforce, elected members and management—but it is only the management that appear to have locked themselves in a bunker, appearing only to issue their edicts and give frankly ludicrous interviews to the media.

That brings me to the chief exec, Warren East. I watched Mr East’s interview with the BBC, in which he was giggling away as he was quizzed about the loss of thousands of UK jobs. I am sure he regrets that that happened, but it was grossly insensitive to the thousands of workers whose livelihoods would be lost as a result of that decision, and they are asking for an apology. I do not want to get personal with regard to Mr East, not least because he took a meeting with me on Friday to discuss the situation, for which I am grateful, and during which, incidentally, he said that the Inchinnan workforce were second to none in the business. But I am told that Mr East and his higher management have shown no interest in dialogue with the workforce. There has now been engagement with the Scottish Government, but that took some time and many requests. I should say that the Scottish Government are absolutely committed to supporting and working with Rolls-Royce to ensure that they do all they can to secure a strong future for Rolls-Royce and its workforce in Scotland.

Rolls-Royce has had a strong relationship with Scotland since 1939, when it built its facility at Hillington. It was built to produce Merlin engines for the RAF’s Hurricanes and Spitfires during world war two, and it produced nearly 24,000 Merlins by the end of the war. I grew up not far from the Hillington site, and I had a good view of the factory’s tall chimney from the family flat close to the site of the old Renfrew airport. It was a bittersweet moment when the factory closed in 2005, when the work moved to a purpose-built facility at Inchinnan and a redeveloped site at East Kilbride. The factory was part of the local landscape, and the investment would surely safeguard jobs for years, perhaps decades, to come, but just seven years later it was announced that the East Kilbride site was to close and that its production was also to move to Inchinnan. Now, just 15 years later, that purpose-built site is itself in grave danger.

It does not have to be this way, not least because of the relationship that Rolls-Royce already has as a tier 1 partner with the Advanced Forming Research Centre—the AFRC—which sits alongside the Rolls-Royce plant. The AFRC is a globally recognised centre of excellence in innovative manufacturing technologies, R&D and metal forming and forging research, which I have visited a number of times. There has also been a huge level of manufacturing-oriented investment in the Inchinnan area, including £39 million of city deal funding to create the Advanced Manufacturing Innovation District Scotland—AMIDS—next to Glasgow airport. Again, this affects the whole site. There has also been £75 million of Scottish Government investment in building and establishing the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland —NMIS—with a further announcement of an additional £20 million on 28 May. Including other partners, this investment is now close to £100 million, so there can be no doubt of the Scottish Government’s commitment to high-value, highly skilled jobs being developed, retained and attracted to Scotland. The question for Rolls-Royce is whether it can match that commitment. There has been no discussion of the long term with the workforce and their representatives. The loyalty shown by the staff at Inchinnan, some of whom have been forced to transfer sites twice during their employment, first from Hillington and then to East Kilbride, has not been repaid and has not been respected.

This highlights a wider problem across the industry. The behaviour of IAG British Airways and its chief executive, Willie Walsh, has been widely reported and condemned in this Chamber and by the Transport Committee. It must be said that the behaviour of IAG British Airways is more reprehensible than that of Rolls-Royce, which still has some sort of relationship with its unions, albeit a little fractious of late. It is simply unacceptable for the loyalty shown by any workers, whether they work for Rolls-Royce, British Airways or anyone else, to be rewarded with the exit door the minute a challenge arises that management think can be met through cost-cutting alone. We cannot have industrial policy run as a race to the bottom with no regard to the longer term or to the communities and families who rely on these jobs.

Yesterday I presented my Employment (Dismissal and Re-employment) Bill to prohibit employers from dismissing employees and subsequently re-employing them for the purposes of diminishing their terms and conditions of employment. I cannot believe that I had to present a Bill to try to make this illegal, but apparently that is the case. Does the Minister think that it is fair for a workforce to be told that they would be made redundant and a proportion rehired on vastly reduced terms and conditions—up to 70%, in some cases? If not, will he back my Bill, or the aim of it, at least, to protect the workers of this country from unscrupulous management?

[Jim Shannon]

Does the hon. Member agree that it is obscene for British Airways or for any other company to take advantage of the Government’s furlough scheme to then change the contracts of their workers? Some of them are my constituents, and they have expressed great concern, anger and dismay that after 30 years of loyal employment with British Airways, they have been discarded. At a time when British Airways has plenty of money in reserves, as well, it seems that its policy may be to give Virgin a run for its money. Does he think that it is now perhaps time for Government to say to British Airways, “It’s time for your slots at Heathrow and elsewhere to be looked at and not given the special treatment that they presently have”?

[Gavin Newlands]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Before the hon. Gentleman answers, the topic of the debate is Rolls-Royce. I absolutely understand people’s anger at what has gone on with British Airways. I will allow a little bit of latitude, but we must really focus on the topic. I think it is an excellent topic for another debate, to be honest.

[Gavin Newlands]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very strong point about the misuse, almost, of the furlough scheme. I know that this has drawn some criticism from Ministers, but if only they had listened at the start, because when they introduced the scheme, we all said that there are no protections in it for redundancies. Other countries have put in protections to stop this sort of behaviour, but the UK Government did not listen, and here we are with regard to British Airways.

[Chris Stephens]

I was pleased to co-sponsor my hon. Friend’s Bill yesterday. There is a wider point about redundancy, particularly as it relates to Rolls-Royce. We are seeing, far too many times, firms choosing to lay off UK workers because it is easier to lay off a worker, in terms of redundancy, in the UK than in other countries. For example, Germany has 120 days’ notice and there has to be a far tougher process. As we come out of lockdown, should not the UK Government be looking at and discussing the whole issue of redundancy when it comes to their legislation going forward?

[Gavin Newlands]

I concur with my hon. Friend. In fact, executives formally allude to the fact that there are different rules and regulations in other countries, and the UK workforce will bear the brunt.

[Patricia Gibson]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so frequently. This is a debate about Rolls-Royce, but is it not a concern that when bad practice is used for all to see, it emboldens other companies in bad behaviour? British Airways has set a bad example with its arrogant attitude to its employees, and it has always had terrible industrial relations. It fails to appreciate that the company is built on the back of the loyal workers; some have worked there for decades. In that context, we are all afraid of what might now happen with Rolls-Royce.

[Gavin Newlands]

I totally agree. I said at the start, when British Airways came out with that horrendous proposal, that it would potentially give the wider sector cover to do something very similar. I have certainly been told stories of small and large businesses looking to do something similar and perhaps waiting to see the outcome of what happens if British Airways is allowed to carry on.

In both cases, Rolls-Royce and British Airways management have made great play of their roots, history and heritage here in this country. In both cases, that pride seems to extend only to proffering their hand for taxpayers’ cash. When it comes to repaying those taxpayers by keeping them in employment, supporting the industry and working together to tackle short-term problems, that heritage suddenly evaporates. Two thirds of Rolls-Royce’s proposed worldwide job cuts are set for the UK. That shows the loyalty the management have towards the communities and citizens of this country.

At the moment, Rolls-Royce employs roughly 52,000 people globally, of whom 23,000 are UK employees—about 44% of the entire workforce, down from 64% in 2000. That is in part as a result of some global acquisitions, but it is also the result of a previous restructuring which offshored jobs from the UK. It is hard, therefore, not to conclude that Rolls-Royce prefers to offshore UK jobs, rather than to work with sector partners and the UK workforce to recover and rebuild for the future, despite the fact that it has been in receipt of £670 million of UK Government money—mainly research and development money—over the past 20 years.

Rolls-Royce in Inchinnan is at the heart of the new advanced manufacturing innovation district that I described. That district represents a drive for world-class manufacturing and industry. I mentioned earlier that those buzzwords have almost become clichés, but in the case of Inchinnan they are 100% true. The maintenance, repair and overhaul of Inchinnan is world leading to the extent that for many years its workers have been sent around Europe and the far east to assist the company’s operations there. Five years ago, Rolls-Royce were recognising the

“dedication and flexibility of the Inchinnan workforce who continue to play a key role on the success of Rolls-Royce.”

What has changed in those five years? If Inchinnan plays a key role, why is it being singled out, disproportionately, as the hardest hit plant in the UK? It is difficult to reconcile Rolls-Royce’s previous faith in the workforce with the treatment it is now meting out.

Ministers have often stood at the Dispatch Box in this Chamber and lauded the kind of manufacturing that Inchinnan is renowned for—as they should. But the test is not what is said in this place and recorded in Hansard; it is the action the Government take to protect and promote our manufacturing sector, particularly at a time when the industry needs action from the state. So far that action has been virtually non-existent when it comes to my constituents and others around the UK. The UK is home to one of the world’s leading aviation and aerospace sectors. It supports more than 1 million jobs in the UK. It is one of the important strategic sectors of industry in this country, if not the most important. It is high time the Government acknowledged that and acted accordingly. We need to hear what the Government plan to do, because when these jobs go, very few, if any, will return. Other global sites will absorb that capacity, and those skills and those jobs will be lost to these shores.

Successive Administrations have made great play of the power of the free market, as if Milton Friedman himself had the skills and craftsmanship to produce the kind of output my constituents produce every day. That sort of ideological nonsense is dead. The impact of covid-19 has shown the need for the state to have a key role in setting the strategy for our economy and intervening where required. The workforce at Inchinnan have shown that they must be listened to, and that decisions must be taken by management after discussion and in consultation with them; not as a paper exercise, but as part of a real long-term plan.

I ask the UK Government to use their influence and power to intervene not just for my constituents in Inchinnan, but for all our aviation and aerospace businesses and workers. This is not the time to let our industries down. The Government laud high-skill production. Now is the time for them to show that they are interested in deeds, not words.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I was going to come to small modular reactors later on. Supporting that programme will mean that Rolls-Royce will have another product line which could become a world beater in a market that we estimate to be worth about £300 billion a year.

[Gavin Newlands]

I hear what the Minister says about liaising with Scottish Enterprise and so forth, and I am aware of the engagement that Rolls-Royce has had with Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish Government, but what are this Government doing, other than warm words with Scottish Enterprise? What are the Government doing to keep the jobs in this country?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, and I hope that as I make some headway in my speech he will recognise what we are doing. I can tell him, because he asked about this earlier, that in terms of financial support the corporate finance facility from the Bank of England has provided £1.8 billion of support to airlines, and £300 million to Rolls-Royce—I will come back to that—and £60 million to Meggitt as well.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Monday 4th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)]

What discussions he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on providing financial support for workers ineligible for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

What discussions he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on providing financial support for workers ineligible for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Nadhim Zahawi)]

My Department is working closely with the Treasury on the coronavirus job retention scheme and the wider Government response. In developing the scheme, the Government have prioritised helping the greatest number of people as quickly as possible.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

As I said, we have tried to prioritise helping the greatest number of people as quickly as possible. To make sure that other people can be helped, including those who are self-employed, a scheme for them is also available. We have tried to do as much as we can through grants, as well as through local government, including £617 million in discretionary grants for businesses that may not be registered for business rates, which can get the additional help that was announced in the past 48 hours.

[Gavin Newlands [V]]

I am not entirely sure whether the Minister or the Secretary of State are listening. The truth is that the coronavirus business loan scheme is not working, partly because some lenders do not trust the Government to stand foursquare behind their loan guarantee without moving the goalposts at a future date. Loganair is just one of many businesses in my constituency with an urgent need to access the scheme through an overly cautious and risk-averse lender. What can the Minister and his colleagues in the Treasury do about that?